Window of Opportunity
by whirlinground
Summary: Modern Bellarke AU - As new neighbors with windows facing each other, how will this revelation affect their neighborly behaviour? Rated M for language and future lusty content. Shorter chapters, steamier content!
1. Chapter 1

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

This is only my second publish, so please bear with me. Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections. Fair warning, this story is planned to be loaded with smut and fun so if that is not your style then avoid this story.

* * *

Beyond the rooftops and trees lay the rolling peaks of the mountains. Despite being in the middle of the city, the view allowed for you to feel closer to the countryside. _What a view._

"Nice view, right?" A woman spoke up, shaking Clarke from her trance. She looked to the voice, an older asian woman stood before her clad in a navy pantsuit.

"Very." She smiled, nodding.

"So as I said, the neighborhood was built in the seventies. The unit needs some updating but you told me you weren't afraid of a little bit or work so I think it'll be a great fit." The woman quickly went into realtor mode. The woman laid out facts and details about the neighborhood and building while Clarke's eyes danced across the facade. She stood in front of a long building that held four houses. It looked like townhomes but the neighborhood claimed it was condominiums. They were painted in a mix of forest green, pale browns and a deep red. Each home had a different look even though they were all one long connected building. Some had brick while others had stucco or wood paneling. The one being shown to her right now was brick and wood paneling. It was standard looking. The neighborhood consisted of multiple long buildings, side by side with varied amounts of yard between each of them. A few buildings were closer together, back to back with eight homes per building. Others were like the one in front of Clarke which only held four homes and separated from the other buildings by closer to seventy feet of yard or common area.

"There are about sixty units in the neighborhood and if you look at Google Earth, you'll see it's like a sea-shell. Plenty of open space away from the main road. I'll show you later but you'll love the back." The woman lead Clarke into the house, unlocking a large brown door. Stepping into the condo, it wasn't very large but it didn't need to be. There was ample space in the first room with a nice shoe closet and small bathroom. A retroarch lead to another living space that had a huge red brick wall with a mantle and fireplace. There was also sliding glass door that lead to a small fenced in back patio. This second room also lead into a kitchen with a bar island. Most of the surfaces were yellows or browns. Clarke knew that would need to go.

There was a lot to take in and Clarke made a list as she was shown to house to compare to the list she had of her needs and desires for a home. The women went back to the front door but took a turn to the stairs behind it. They formed and 'L' and lead to the second story. The first room on the left was the master. It had the weirdest carpeted bench in one side of a wall-length shallow closet. Around the corner lead to two other bedrooms, one fairly large and one much smaller. The other two doors in the hallway lead to a deep linen closet and a full bath. After inspecting each room and chatting with the realtor, they headed back downstairs. To Clarkes surprise there was mirror paneling in the stairwell on the far wall. She almost laughed at the site and knew that would be gotten rid of. Hell even the edges of the mirror had a seventies crackle paint over it.

Downstairs, the realtor lead Clarke out the back patio which was gated. It opened into a common grass area. A small hill set her building and the one behind it apart by a nice distance. "This would be a great safe area for your daughter, and over here you'll see a flat top behind the mailboxes. This is the the central building of the neighborhood so the mailboxes are conveniently right there." The woman gestured to a flat top of slabs of concrete. They took up a large part of grass and connected the a sidewalk that lined a parking area.

"Beyond the car park is a creek. It's been terraformed in the past few years with paved trails." She exclaimed pointing off past a row of cars and the driveway that wove through the neighborhood. "Oh and if you follow the sidewalk around the block you'll find a playground." She added, gesturing behind the eight-home building behind them.

"So, Miss Griffin, what do you think? Raven said you'd love it, I hope she was right." The woman faced Clarke and waited for her review.

Clarke's face was blank but she nodded. "She's not wrong. I think it's perfect for us. A little bit of work and it'll be just what the three of us need." She confirmed her friends words to the realtor. With that, it was settled. Clarke was buying a home for her and Madi with Raven being their roommate. This was a big step, and within a week of signing the papers, Clarke was given the key to her very first house.

* * *

Driving in from the main road, Bellamy noticed the for sale sign that sat in the window of one of the units in front of his building had finally been removed. _Wonder when that happened._ He gave it little though and found his favorite parking spot right next to the mailboxes. It was a long strip of single spots that lined the sidewalk, but he could see his car from the house if he needed to. A long sidewalk also happened to land there, and lead right to his front door. The perks of living in the middle unit.

Closing the door behind him and dropping his keys on the table by the door, he called out. "When did the house in front of us sell?" He idly asked no one specifically. Feet quickly came down the stairs and a voice followed, answering him. "Like two days ago, I think?" She spoke before passing him by and heading to the kitchen. "Hope they don't suck." Bellamy said dryly to which the girl laughed.

"Bell, you'll think anyone sucks if it's not a quiet old person or a sexy girl to drool over." The girl replied from the kitchen before turning the sink on. Bellamy walked through the living room into the kitchen and pinched the girl. "O, I don't drool, they do." He winked at her.

"Ugh, you're gross, big brother." Octavia flicked water at Bellamy who despite his best efforts, he failed to dodge. He reached and stole some grapes from the ones she was cleaning in the sink then took off to his room upstairs to change. Bellamy shed his work clothes and slid on black basketball shorts. He was planning on working out and made his way to the smallest room in the house. The room was tiny only fitting a small convertible desk which houses the computer and two smaller monitors. Behind that was a small armchair and in the opposite corner was an all-in-one workout bench and station. This room was where Bellamy spent a lot of his free time. If he wasn't gaming on the PC, he was working out. There was also a small bookcase against the wall and a deep but narrow closet that he and his roommates used for junk.

After his workout he went to shower the gleam of sweat off his tanned skin and slipped into shorts and a shirt. By then Octavia had prepared them a light meal of a salad and grilled chicken and her boyfriend, Lincoln had gotten home. Bellamy used to live here alone, but when Octavia and Lincoln moved in they took the master and half the responsibilities. It was rough at first but they had a dynamic and flow now and Bellamy wouldn't have it any other way.

 **-x-**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

Over the next two weeks Clarke had a blast renovating her new home. Raven joined her some evenings and Madi, Clarke's daughter would also help on the weekends. The three of them made the house their own by gutting the dated kitchen and updating it with granite and modern colors. They had painted the once dingy brick wall and fireplace a crisp clean white that looked very shabby chic. That would seemingly become the theme of the house with a lot of upcycled wood pieces, whites, creams, and pops of softer colors. They had lifted up brown carpet and laid a mid-tone wood flooring through the entire home, or had a company do it. During the end of the second week, Clarke spent her time in what would be Madi's room, painting the smaller room in shades of purple. Most of the room was a soft muted purple with an accent wall of a deeper eggplant tone. The trim was all a crisp white including her closet doors and floating shelves. It would match the bed frame once it was in the room. What really took her time was the mural on the ceiling. An expansive and fantastic representation of the night sky full with stars and galaxies had taken over, even masking the once-white ceiling fan as part of a galaxy system and the lampshade being a sun. Dozens of red cups littered a table as evidence of the amount of work Clarke had put in. She really wanted to give Madi something special.

As for the other two bedrooms, Raven was given the master. The awkward little shelf built into the closet proved helpful as the woman had a disability she would always live with. It sort of just suited her to have that room. She opted for navy and light brown tones with white accents for her colors and did most of the paintjob herself. Clarke stepped in to paint the ceiling for her, a clean fresh coat of white. When it came to the final bedroom Clarke painted her walls a soft grey with an accent wall of a rich blue-green almost like that of the Tiffany's box. Nothing fancy was done to either older girls room. The bathrooms were both left in their seventies horror, as their budget didn't allow for upgrades.

Madi didn't get to see her room when it was done, she wouldn't until after they had moved in and set everything up. Speaking of which, move in day had arrived. It was early on Saturday and they had a U-haul parked in front of the house. Unfortunately, it blocked passing traffic so they parked one of their cars at the driveway so people didn't turn down into the driveway and get stuck by the truck. There were more than one entry point for the neighborhood. Clarke and Raven had the help of Raven's co-worker Kyle and her boss Sinclaire. They were the only man-power the girls could gather for moving day. After bringing in most of the boxes and their sofa, Raven and Clarke had sat in the house unpacking. Around lunchtime, Clarke was the only one inside and the U-haul was mostly empty. She stepped out onto the front stoop to see Raven and the guys sitting on the bed of Kyle's truck.

"Hey, I ordered Red Robin for us." Raven looked over to Clarke. "Got you your chicken wrap and the garlic fries." She let her know without Clarke even having to ask.

"You're the best." Clarke smiled, sitting next to her in the bed of the truck.

"I know."

Kyle and Sinclair laughed and spent the next twenty minutes trying to pick on Raven which was something both men loved doing. She held her own in their little argument and Clarke just laughed and would get lost in her phone. She was texting Madi.

 _(1:06 PM) Madi: I could have helped today, you know._

Her twelve year old attitude showing even in text.

 _(1:06 PM) Clarke: It would ruin the surprise._

 _(1:08 PM) Madi: Blah! You're no fun._

 _(1:09 PM) Clarke: Love you too, Kid._

Moments later a car pulled up looking lost, and it was their delivery. Raven had already paid on an app, so the four took their food and ate right there in the bed of the truck. Most of the conversation was about work as all but Clarke were co-workers. They were all mechanics, Sinclair being the owner of the shop which specialized in big trucks and utility vehicles repair which was Raven's personal favorite. Sinclair would ask Clarke about Madi, to bring her into the topic. She could go on about the kid, she was a highlight in Clarke's life and everyone knew that. Seeing that side of Clarke evolve over the years was a treat for those who knew her. After the group ate and cleaned up they all packed up and went to load up on bedroom furniture. She figured it would be the last as all three beds could fit in the U-Haul and Kyle's truck could fit the few leftovers. They had less belongings than most would assume of two twenty-something women and a twelve year old girl.

When they got back to the house they began with Madi's bedroom furniture. Everything was smaller and much easier to move. Raven and Clarke arranged the room while the guys took a break outside and guarded the trucks. Looking over at her friend, Clarke could see the day wearing on her. She looked peeved, more than likely her leg causing her pain.

"Why don't you boss us around for a bit? My voice is tired." Clarke smiled, offering her friend a break from anything else. Raven wouldn't have taken a simple request to sit out so Clarke had to be creative.

"Wick loves it when I'm bossy." She grinned with a hint of something else in her eyes. She hobbled back downstairs and left the house. Clarke finished up with Madi's room just shifting pieces around until they fit right. She'd finish everything else up after the rest of the rooms were furnished. She took to the stairs, scoffing at the large mirror that still stood at the top of the stairwell. The thing was gaudy at best and they had put off removing it for now as it was more out of the way and to be honest they had sort of forgotten about it. Though Raven had managed to make a few jokes about obscene things one could do with such a large mirror, of course if it weren't for the user having to be at the top of a staircase to enjoy said mirror.

Stepping down the last stairs and pushing the door out of her way only to open it, she was greeted by her friends outside talking to a stranger who had joined them. She only took moments to drink him in, but she couldn't help her stare. He was gorgeous. Tan skin stretched over a narrow but muscular build and his hair was almost black and slightly unkempt. Just as her eyes danced at the toned cheeks under his jeans, he turned to look at her. Her eyes scanned up his half-turned body meeting the most adorably yet smouldering face she had ever seen. Freckles. _Fuck._

"Don't trip." Raven hollered at her, bringing Clarke out of her trance. She looked down and quickly made sure she didn't trip as she was blindly stepping down the stoop to meet them. Fighting a surge of pink in her cheeks, she refused to look back to the new person standing around them as she walked up to her friends.

"Clarke, this is one of our new neighbors, Baloney?" Raven smiled purposefully butchering his name and giving him a flirtatious look.

The stranger cleared his throat and smiled, "Bellamy." _Oh sweet baby dinosaur Jesus, his voice sounded as good as he looked. Bellamy._ Clarke's overly educated mind quickly translated the origin of his name. _Beautiful indeed._ Just then she realized he was holding his hand out to her. She took it unsurely. "I'm Clarke." The man smiled at her and looked half boy half devil in one fell swoop. She likely would have continued painting him in her mind if Kyle hadn't coughed.

"Bellamy here offered to help." Kyle stated while helping Raven up onto the tailgate, noting she was going to sit out as suggested. It didn't need to be brought up as those who knew Raven knew not to talk about her like she was broken. She did need a break though, so she got one.

"And I get to boss everyone around." She gloated from her seat, looking to Clarke who returned the smile.

"Well, Raven's room is next." Clarke cleared her throat and got back into a serious mode. She gestured to a simple bed frame that was next in order in the U-Haul. It was in many pieces, some of which were lighter. Bellamy didn't need to be invited, he easily threw himself to their air. He stepped up into the U-Haul and handed the footboard down to Clarke. They traded a glance as she took it. Kyle and Sinclair moved the heavier pieces, leaving Clarke and Bellamy to lighter pieces. The fine part of her bed to move was a large headboard. Bellamy took the lead, Clarke on the other end. She was relieved, afraid that if she were on the backward end of this she'd stumble and make an ass of herself. They worked together effortlessly and carried the large piece up the stairs. The only real issue was a tight turn into her room from the stairwell.

"My sister has a similar frame, I can put it all together for you." He said to Clarke as she and the other two men were heading back downstairs.

"Oh you don't have to." She stopped, looking over to him.

"I insist, it'll take me maybe five minutes if you have an allen wrench." He looked over the pieces like it was very familiar. Clarke couldn't say no twice, he was being very kind.

"Of course, I'll be right back." She took off to get a set of allen wrenches that Raven had. They had more tools and any two women would ever be suspected to own. Clarke wasn't a stranger to them. She brought the little black plastic box back upstairs to him and Kyle and Sinclair began moving her bed pieces in. She didn't have a frame, so they weren't needed in that moment.

"Here." She turned into the room to see him already holding two pieces together. She opened the box. "Which one do you need?"

Bellamy looked at the bolt and said "Five mil." Clarke knew quickly that was one of the mid sized ones, grabbed it and handed it to him. He motioned her to take his place in holding two pieces together. She slid into place and held them, most of the weight on him. He quickly fastened two bolts into place and helped her lower that section down. This repeated for less than five minutes before she helped him snap the headboard into place. They moved it into place along recessed wall then dropped the mattresses into place.

"Thank you." She said quietly, putting the wrench back away and tucking the small box into her hand.

"Not a problem." He smiled again. _My God._

The two rejoined the group just in time to help move up tables, dressers, drawer and the like. Raven had a huge old dresser with a hutch. That took all available hands to move and position, including Raven who stood back commanding left or right. After that they brought up Clarke's small Ikea dresser, a plain table top and legs that would screw in, and an easel. Everything else was downstairs and would be set up later. A lot of art supply.

Once they were all done the group locked up and moved the vehicles. Bellamy joined them in the living room just as Kyle had finished setting up the wide-screen on the wall, next to the sliding glass door that lead to the patio. Clarke entered the living room.

"Yeah, right across the lawn. Unit 4" Bellamy pointed out the window, Raven following his point.

"Awesome. You like this neighborhood?" She said, hobbling back over to the soda and gingerly setting herself down. Clarke knew she was in pain, it was blatant at this point.

"I've lived here since I was twenty-three, so eight years? It's quiet around here." He said very simply. He didn't seem to be a many of many words, very to the point.

Sinclair came in with a six-pack of beers, and handed one off to everyone including Bellamy. He looked bewildered at the offer, like a nice gesture was new to him. Kyle pat his shoulder and slid next to Raven on the couch. "You earned it man, sit, drink with us."

Bellamy looked to Clarke almost as if he wanted her approval. She quickly gave him a motionless nod and took her own beer, sitting on a stool from under the kitchen counter.

The group and their new neighbor didn't stay long as the night was falling and most of them were beat from such a busy day. Sinclair was the first to take leave, hugging both girls before leaving. Not long after, Raven escorted Kyle out which likely meant they were making out in his truck. Bellamy was left with Clarke alone for only a minute or so before he decided to take his leave. He awkwardly brushed his hand through his hair and met her gaze.

"If you need anything, I'm just across the back lawn." He said, setting his now empty bottle down on their counter. She stood to see him off but quickly turned.

"We should probably let you out the back." She suggested suddenly, which seemed very out of place. She sheepishly looked toward the front door as if to silently tell him they shouldn't interrupt Raven and Kyle if they are still there. Bellamy questioned it, his face riddled with confusion but he caught on and chuckled. The wrinkles at the corner of his eyes when he laughed were sharp. "Closer for me anyways." He smiled as she unlocked and slid the back door open, followed by an annoying screen door. She flicked the patio light on and it didn't go. Noticing another thing to do she sighed.

He noted her frustration silently and followed her out onto the patio. She unlocked and opened the gate that lead to a flat top and the lawn that separated their buildings. As he passed her through the gate, he turned at the end.

"It was nice meeting you, Clarke." He held his hand out again. She slid hers into his, the warmth ever present.

"You too, Bellamy. Thanks for the help today." She said, their hands still together. She meekly took her hand from his and smiled. Bellamy walked off up the hill to his front door not some seventy feet away. She locked up behind herself and went back inside. The girls would still be busy if Raven ever came back inside. Unpacking and moving little things could last a while, but for now she was content of just organizing some things. The night would go on only until about ten before both girls would pass out in their freshly dressed beds.

 **-x-**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

The trio had settled in and made their house a home. When Clarke had revealed Madi's new room to the girl, she was so elated she couldn't help herself but scream. The two even spent a few nights laying together and staring up at the work of art as if they were outside looking at real stars. It would become routine for them to makeup and name their own constellations, even Raven would help from time to time. It didn't take long at all for the house to look lived in, especially by women. Product and clothes littered both bathrooms, the upstairs fell victim to it the most. Clarke had put off setting up her art supply because she just wanted to relax. It was overdue though, so she could get back to work.

After arranging her easel with a line of light from the window and moving her two tables around into an L shape against the wall, she felt her room was in order. Her bed had room to move around, but most of the room was occupied by her work space. A dresser nestled in her closet to free up even more space. Lastly, she set her stool up behind the tables, facing the window. She sat down and looked at her layout, feeling if it would work for her. She smiled triumphantly, a feeling of completeness washing over her. As she sat there however, she realized the one thing she had forgotten throughout the entire house. Curtains. Sighing, she stood and looked at the window, trying to decide what to do. The neighbors were far enough away, and her bed close enough to the wall to not be a privacy concern unless she were changing.

"Raven!" She hollered out, beckoning her friend. A minute passed before the woman appeared.

"What's up?" She asked, coming into the room with a spoon in hand, as she must have been cooking.

"We need curtains." She said pointing to her naked window. Raven sighed.

"Or… just dance around naked and see if our sexy neighbor boy likes the view." Raven playfully suggested.

Clarke whipped around and looked at her, threatening to throw a pillow her hand had found. Raven laughed and ducked out of the room, returning downstairs. Clarke rolled her eyes, peering out the window. She counted four doors over from the left, knowing that was where said sexy neighbor boy lived. Three windows on the front of his house, all of which lined up with those of her own. In that moment, she realized not only could he see into their home, but she could see into his. She wondered in that moment how much of her life would be on display, if he were to even notice. Why though, did she suddenly care? How this guy she met once was somehow on her mind, making her feel vulnerable for a split second.

"Yep, we need curtains." Clarke said to herself, resolving the issue and turning out of the room.

Later that week, Clarke decided to go shopping for curtains. She went so far as to get the measurements for each window that needed to be dressed and had a list with her. When at the store though, it was overwhelming the amount of choices. Scanning over the selection, she opted to just go with Madi's room first. A set of long panels that were a solid dark purple-blue shade with holes punched through out seemed perfect. They would let light shine through the little holes like stars punching through the night sky. For Raven's sliding glass door, she grabbed a set of thick black curtains that were insulated. Adding to her cart, she threw in a set of sheer beige curtains for the front room, and a set of navy ones for the sliding glass door that lead to the patio. A matching curtain to fit the tiny window next to that, and sheer blue ones for the kitchen. For the final decision, she scanned for her own room. She wanted to let enough light in while she needed it during her work hours, but she really wanted to block out light while she slept. Boy was she a crabby person in the morning. She decided to get a duel set that would block out all light when she wanted, and a sheer set overtop for other times. Content with her outing, she paid and returned home to install all of the curtains.

At home, after installing the curtains in every window but the two sliding glass doors, she plopped down in a heap on the couch and gave up. Laying there with the house to herself, she let herself nod off into a midday nap.

* * *

"Touchdown!" Bellamy screamed, jumping up from the couch with Lincoln grumbling beside him. The two were playing Madden 2018 on Xbox and clearly Bellamy just scored against Lincoln.

"Alright, I'm tired of losing and I need to get going. Well played, Blake." Lincoln stood, relenting to his loss he gave up. Bellamy smiled and the two bro-hugged. Lincoln retreated to his room to get ready, leaving Bellamy to fall back into the couch. He stretched out on it and basked in his victory. After Lincoln left, Bellamy peeled himself off of the couch and went upstairs. He entered the smallest room in the house and sat down at the computer. Waiting for it to power up, he noticed the reflection in the glass of the portrait hanging behind his monitors. It was a direct reflection of Clarke's house. He noted it, then put his focus back on the monitors as they woke to life. For the next few hours, Bellamy got lost in a video game until he got bored. The sun had fallen outside when he felt restless from sitting there, and stood.

Stretching his muscles, his body turned toward the window. Through the old slatted blinds covering the small window, he could see clear as day into Clarke's living room. The lights were on and he could see a smaller girl on the couch next to the latina he met the other day. From the kitchen came Clarke with a bowl, who sat beside the smaller girl who then leaned into Clarke and the three settled in and focused on what he assumed to be the TV. He smiled, thinking the scene was charming before turning his focus to a low rumble in his stomach. _Dinner time._

A nice meal with his sister, her beloved and a binge session of Game of Thrones ended off their nights, with Bellamy falling asleep on the couch alone.

 **-x-**


	4. Chapter 4

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

Grunting, Bellamy was covered in sweat. A gloss over his entire form, clad only in basketball shorts, he thrusted the bar in his hands up and let it settle in the bracket where it sat when not in use.

"And fifty." He growled, completing his set. He moaned as he peeled his back off the bench and sat up, sore from doing five sets of ten reps each. Allowing his spine to decompress and his shoulders to relax, he rolled his neck before letting his gaze land on the window of his newest neighbor. He found himself scanning the window he knew to be her own, curious of how she was, or what she may be up to. While Bellamy wasn't a creep, stalker, or generally nosey person, he was drawn to that window, or maybe it was to the woman he would catch a glimpse of.

Before today, while going to bed the other night he noticed Clarke in her room. The light shining out of the window against the black of outside made it hard to not notice her in her room. Sheer curtains obscured the view, but he could make out that she was standing at an easel, and she was painting. He couldn't quite see what she was painting, but it was relaxing to watch if only for a moment. Being the fly on the wall was enticing, learning things about someone just by observing them. He made sure to not watch long, just a glimpse and acknowledgement of what she was up to before going about his business.

Today, he saw nothing. Her curtains were drawn. He went back to stretching before going to take a shower as per usual. After his shower, Bellamy left to run errands.

A few days later, Bellamy was turning in for the night after a very rough work day. His body ached and his soul ached even more. If he weren't so damn tired, he would beckon over Echo to relieve some of his stress but he could barely muster the energy to walk up the stairs. Entering his room, he shed off his work clothes and stretched as his bare skin drank in being free from confines. As he came down from his stretch and looked out his window, he saw Clarke in her own room doing the same. Unknowingly, he found himself frozen in place and watching as she unknowingly put on a show.

Clarke stood in her room facing her bed which must have been under the window. He watched shed her sweater and stretch her arms out over her head, taking notice of how her body shifted while her arms moved above her head and she shifted her spine. After what looked to be a very relaxing stretch she then peeled off her tank top, turning slightly as she did so. Her pants followed, but that was out of his view which almost disappointed him. Standing back upright after shedding herself of her pants, Clarke suddenly noticed she was putting on a show. Even through the distance between the windows, Bellamy could feel her eyes bore through him and he quickly tried to act casual, alone in his own room. _Fuck._ He was caught, and as he tried to look away and not make it seem as if he were watching her, he caught her quickly closing her curtains and ending his show. A pang of guilt washed over him, and he felt like he had done wrong. He awkwardly closed his own curtains before sliding himself into bed. While half aroused, he couldn't do anything about it given how bad he now felt. Luckily when he nestled into his bed sleep quickly took over him.

* * *

Clarke had finally mounted the last of the curtains, and the house felt complete. Sure, there would be things here and there that the three women would alter or change. It was their home after all and they would have forever to do with it as they pleases. Raven was home the least with work and now steadily dating Wick. Madi would be gone daily for school, so Clarke had the house to herself most days as she worked from home. Hours were spent in her room doing art projects that she would sell in her online store while the rest of her time was spent in the living room doing yoga to keep in shape, or in the kitchen doing meal prep for the three of them.

Busy all day, Clarke was tired. She had been hunched over her desk most of the afternoon before being beckoned to her mother's house for a family meal which was daunting only because more people showed up than anyone anticipated when Abby had invited over a co-worker, who subsequently brought their children. Madi and Clarke ended up entertaining two six year olds who were relentless and overly energetic. Madi had enough of them very quickly, leaving Clarke to do most of the entertaining by herself while Madi snuck away and entertained herself with Clarke's phone. Being back at home felt so good and after tucking Madi in to bed and locking up, Clarke slid into her bedroom for the night.

Free from her family and any obligation, she decided to free herself from her clothing to. Enjoying her freedom after a long day, Clarke took her time to peel the clothing from her body as if she were shedding the stress of the day. Freeing her skin felt so good and she enjoyed every moment of it up until she stepped out of her jeans and stood tall, to see dark eyes on her body from across the lawn. Bellamy was watching her. _Oh shit_. Suddenly feeling self conscious, she dove over the bed and pulled the curtains closed as best she could. Staying on her bed, feeling concealed, she layed on her bed in only panties and a bra.

Her mind reeled, catching someone watching her. She was conflicted. Should she be angry or feel creeped out? Not knowing how to feel, she kind of laid there awkwardly before she felt like finishing the job, slipping into an oversized t-shirt, killing the lights and turning in for the night. Pulling the blankets over her body and settling in, she couldn't help but feel aroused rather than creeped out. She wasn't sure if it was because she knew someone was watching her, or because she also saw him in the same state of undress. Which one enticed her more, she didn't know but that night she didn't fall asleep until she had eased the hunger of lust within her.

 **-x-**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

It was a lukewarm day despite being in the latter months of the year. Bellamy was walking from his door to the his car as he noticed a large bright sheet of paper taped to the mailboxes. He took a step out of his routine see what the new note was for. Scanning over it, a slight grimace formed on his face. It was a neighborhood potluck. _Who does this anymore?_ He knew immediately Octavia would force them to participate which partly made him want to peel the paper off the mailbox and pretend he never saw it. But alas, Octavia was too smart for that. She'd know, or find out, and she'd force them to be neighborly. Pushing it out of his mind, Bellamy got into his car and went to work.

The following weekend was the potluck and Octavia did indeed find out and promised the neighbor organizing the little shin-dig a contribution to the meal. Octavia however couldn't cook her way out of a paper bag. Lincoln was busy at work, which left only one person to fulfill her promise.

"Bellllll, please!" She whined, pulling off an adorably cute and pathetic look all in one.

"You're promise, you're problem O." He walked away from the puppy dog eyes, and sat himself down on the sofa with a tall mug of tea in hand.

"You know I can't cook." She followed him.

Rolling his eyes at her, "Yet, you promised you'd bring something."

"We need to socialize with our neighbors, Bellamy." Hands at her hips, and looking like their mother she tried to scold him. Bellamy laughed. Something in the back of his mind told him to do it though. He wasn't consciously aware of this nagging feeling that he should appease his sister, but it was there.

"What did you even say you'd bring?" He asked blankly, looking at the TV not her.

"Nothing, I left it open on purpose." She batted her eyelashes.

A long minute or so of silence lingered with her boring holes through his skull before he caved.

"Fine." He hummed out, a low annoyance. She dove to his side and wrapped her arms around him, kissing his cheek.

"I knew I could count on you."

"Mhm." He rolled his eyes.

"So, I was thinking-"

"Oh of course you were, because you planned this out. Let me guess," he thought on what her favorites were for a moment. "Cookies or Wing?"

Octavia lit up and smiled, moving back off the sofa and resuming an innocent yet somehow diabolic body language. "Both?" She took off, out of the room to avoid his glare or words of battle. Bellamy went from wide-eyed to amused and annoyed all in one. He couldn't resist though. The girl always got her way, that's what big brothers do. Letting the conversation move from his mind, Bellamy focused on the show he was watching until it ended and he saw the clock. He just then realized the get together was tomorrow and he didn't have anything he needed to make what his sister wanted.

"Shit." He sighed, and quickly got up from the couch. He surveyed the kitchen briefly before finding his keys and heading to the store.

* * *

"I'd rather not, Madi." Clarke said sternly over a cutting board in the kitchen as the twelve year old girl sat on a stool, kicking her feet, at the other end of the counter where the bar top hung over.

"But you don't know anyone, and nor do I or Raven and it would be fun." She pleaded.

"I know exactly who I need to." She smiled to her daughter warmly.

Madi smiled back, but quickly rolled her eyes. "You never want to meet new people, you think everyone is a bad guy." Clarke looked surprised by the statement. It was true, to a point. She was very hesitant of new people and not trusting, also always very formal and short. Madi calling her out on it flooded her with a pang of guilt though. Her blue eyes flickered down to the brussel sprouts she was cutting idly for a moment before she put the knife down. She looked to Madi.

"Fine. We can go for a bit." She conceded to her kid, more so for her kid. Madi bounced off the stool and came around the counter to hug her.

"Now get out of here and clean up." Clarke nagged her, but the girl happily obliged taking off to her room. Clarke resumed her chopping contently, knowing Madi was happy.

At dinner the ladies talked about their days and Madi brought up the potluck again, suggesting they bring something.

"It's tomorrow, Mads. We don't really have time to make something." Clarke suggested between mouthfuls of dinner.

"Sure we do. It's not late and it's tomorrow afternoon." Madi pleaded.

Raven cleared her mouth of food and chimed in. "Little Boss isn't going to relent, Clarke. We both know this. I could toss together some charred corn salad or something." She offered. Madi got excited and smiled.

"You know what, I've got an idea." Clarke grinned. Madi begged to know what it was but she held out and they finished dinner. After the kitchen was clean, Clarke pulled down the canister of flour and sugar and looked over at her eager child.

"What is it?" She begged. Raven laughed.

"Let's make them mixed berry pies, personal little ones." Clarke suggested. It was a little bit more work but easier for a potluck scenario and boy did Madi think it would be fun because she bounced in her seat before coming around to the other side of the counter.

"Wash your hands. Two batches of dough should be enough." Clarke said.

"I'll do the filling." Raven declared.

Two hours later the house smelled of warm fruity pie and the girls were all tired with dots of flour on their clothing and faces. It was inevitable that they would make a mess because giving a twelve year old access to flour somehow always ended in a war. On the counter were four cooling racks and thirty-something small pies. Each one unique and some of them were in different shape. Madi had a blast being creative.

"We don't know if they are any good." The kid suggested, to which both women laughed.

"Just one, then you need to go shower and get your buns in bed." Clarke relented.

"I love you!" She squealed, hugging her mother and plucking a warm pie from a pan. Raven asked to sneak a bite, which she reluctantly allowed before running off upstairs as told. The adults were left to clean the kitchen.

"I've got it Ray, go relax." Clarke offered, only to be elbowed by the other woman. They didn't argue, and cleaned up together. After it was all finished the two plopped down on the sofa together for a bit and watched some TV before they both got too tired to stay awake any longer.

In her room, Clarke was ready to yet again shed her day and slide into bed to fall asleep in warmth and comfort. As she began undressing, she had this feeling she needed to stop and remembered last time. Looking through her sheer curtains, she didn't see any life or light in the man's windows. She almost felt disappointed, but relieved at the same time. She turned out her own lights before changing and climbing in to bed to sleep her day away.


	6. Chapter 6

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

It was the day of the potluck, and to Octavia's delight, Bellamy pulled through. The two of them walked out of their apartment, down the tiny hill that lead to the paved play area that the event was taking place. A handful of mismatched tables had been set up with even more obscure fashions of table clothes on them. Only a few neighbors had shown up, likely the ones who set this whole thing up, so there weren't many dishes on the table or people yet to meet. Octavia was eager, and walked quickly down to meet them. She set down a large casserole dish that was overflowing with red glossy chicken wings and met the few older women that were there. Bellamy was more slow and reluctant but eventually found himself next to his sister with a platter of chunky cookies in his hand.

"Here he is. Ladies, this is my big brother Bellamy." Octavia proudly introduced him to three older gals who stood before him. They took no shame in drinking in the site, and he felt a little bashful in that moment. Older gals loved him and he never knew how to respond to it. So what did he do? Held out the platter. "Cookie?" He said dryly, his tone friendly but bland. One of the three eagerly took a cookie and gave him a flirty little wink. He smiled out of politeness.

"They are triple chocolate chunk, my favorite." Octavia nodded proudly, as if she made them. The gal with the cookie took a bite and her face displayed nothing but joy. She pay Bellamy's arm flirtatiously, again, and praised him on his cookies. Before the topic could get weirder for him, he politely set the platter down and excused himself.

"I'll be back, ladies. Need to clean up a bit." He said, referring to his kitchen, not himself. They sadly nodded, dismissing him and left Octavia so socialize when he jogged back up to the house and was relieved to be hiding inside again. To buy himself time, Bellamy did actually find something to clean up. He spent about thirty minutes inside, hoping more neighbors would show up and he wouldn't be left with a group of flirty middle-aged women. He peeked out the window to see if anyone else was there yet, and he was surprised to see a few dozen people. If he had to guess, about forty people were out there? The table had been filling up and a bunch of mismatched chairs appeared. His eyes flickered over to his neighbor's house, wondering if she'd be there. He didn't dwell on it. He washed his hands up and headed out the door, to join the socializing as he knew his sister wouldn't let him stay inside all day.

Joining the group, he slid in behind his sister who was chatting with couple that looked no older than him, with a toddler on the mother's hip. Bellamy easily fell into socializing and felt comfortable in moments.

* * *

"Let's go!" Madi yelled with an authority no twelve year old girl should have. Raven raised her hands in defeat and backed away from the girl.

"I'm sorry Master! I told her we're ready!" She joked, mocking the bouncy pre-teen. Madi scowled at her, but they both quickly laughed it off and Raven put an arm around the kids shoulders. The two stood at the bottom of the stairs looking up, waiting. Clarke finally appeared, tugging a long sleeve shirt over her tank top as she made it to the bottom landing.

"Fine, fine. You don't have to yell at me, Mom." She said leaning in to Madi a bit, who rolled her eyes.

"You didn't even change?" The pre-teen asked.

Clarke looked down and surveyed her outfit before lifting her arms to jokingly check for odor. "I look fine Madi."

"First impressions, Clarke." Madi said pointedly, even waving a finger like a scolding mother. Clarke rolled her eyes and poked the girl who giggled.

"I'll wash my hand and grab the pies, begon child! Do not eat only sweets either, Madi." Clarke found her own finger waving to the girl then pointing to the door. Madi rolled her eyes but happily walked out the door with Raven in hand, pulling her out to the potluck. Clarke hadn't even looked to see if anyone was there, all she had to do was look out the back door but it never dawned on her. She slipped into her kitchen and scrubbed paint off her hands before grabbing tupperware cake box that had been lined with parchment and loaded with the tiny pies. On her way out the door, something made her check her reflection for a scant moment to make sure she was presentable. She was, and so she left.

All she had to do was walk around the side of her building and see a large group of people surrounding a mess of tables and chairs, mingling and snacking. There were a surprising number of kids in the mix that Clarke didn't know lived here, which made her smile knowing Madi would have people to play with. A handful were too young, but there were a few kids in the mix who were old enough that Madi wouldn't mind playing with them. She walked through the grass and quickly looked down to dodge a dog-shit-landmine. Approaching her roomate and daughter, she shrugged off the irritation of the minefield and put on her most social smile she could muster. Introductions where the normal. People were surprised she had such a masculine name, complimented how the food looked and the occasional compliment about Madi.

The three of them found themselves at the table in line with paper plates. There was so much to look at and Clarke had to not only monitor all the sweets Madi wanted, but apparently Raven too!

"I didn't know I had two daughters." Clarke laughed, and Raven rolled her eyes picking up a cookie and putting it on her plate.

"You know I'm not cooking, so eat up. Eat real food." She said to both of them in a low tone, and they nodded. Clarke browsed and grabbed a little bit of a pasta salad, some cheese from a charcuterie platter and a gorgeously red apple. When Madi wasn't looking, she snuck herself one of the same cookies Raven had grabbed, and a scoop of gummy bears someone had brought. Seems the three of them had a sweet-tooth. Walking away from the table she had bit into the cookie and was looking down at it on her plate trying to decide what was in it, she bumped into someone and quickly looked up.

"Oh sorry." She said softly. Her face pinked a bit realizing who it was. "Oh".

"My bad, I was looking behind me." His voice was so deep and lush, Clarke instantly thought about their window show-down the other night.

"And I was looking down." She chuckled awkwardly.

"Bet it was the cookie." He noted, seeing her fingers still on it and some crumbs on the corner of her mouth. He thoughtlessly reached up to the corner of her mouth and wiped the crumbs off. Her skins erupted in goosebumps at the contact and she blushed even more.

"Yeah, it's really good." She nodded, regaining herself.

"Thanks. My secret recipe." He grinned.

Oh shit, he can bake? "Oh, they are yours? Super yummy." She nodded again.

"Well thank you. I'd give you the recipe, but I'd have to kill you." He was joking but he made his face look as serious as possible which caused Clarke to give out a hearty laugh. He smiled as his success. In that same moment Octavia appeared beside him and slid and arm around his waist. Clarke looked at the gorgeous svelte woman and instantly wondered what their relationship was. Bellamy slid his arm around the smaller girl and smiled big.

"O, this is our newest neighbor, Clarke." He gestured to the blond while looking to his sister.

"Clarke, this is my annoying little sister, Octavia."

A wash of relief hit Clarke for no reason at the introduction. She held her hand out to the gorgeous brunette. "It's nice to meet you. Your brother here was a big help on our moving day."

Octavia shook Clarke's hand firmly and with confidence. "He told me all about it." Her smile turned sinister, which lead Clarke to wonder exactly what Bellamy said. Bellamy diverted quickly though.

"Anyways, don't mind us. I was just grabbing some food." He gestured to the buffet behind Clarke.

"Right, I am just looking for Raven-" Before she got to finish, he looked to his right and pointed.

"I think I saw her over in the grass, with the kids." Bellamy pointed, his tone seemed to be curious though.

"Oh, thanks." Clarke shifted to head for Raven and Madi, but Bellamy stood in front of her for a second.

"By the way, you have a little bit of paint right here." He reached out and gently touched her flesh. A chill ran through her core and sent her skin into tiny bumps. The reaction was so involuntary she slightly cocked her head into his touch, but caught herself. Her hand came up to where he touched and she felt the dry paint near her ear and blushed harder than before.

"Oh, ha, thank you." She awkwardly rubbed at the spot and used that moment to get away. She found Raven and Madi in the grass with some of the other kids, and Raven sitting with presumably another parent. Clarke joined them and greeted the other woman, but was distant. Her eyes flicked back over to Bellamy and her body replayed the action of feeling his fingers on her face. Distractedly, she picked at her food until Raven had to push her shoulder to get her attention. Brought back to reality, Clarke paid attention to Raven and the the other woman. Around thirty minutes later, Madi got restless and asked if she and some of the other kids could go over to the playground. The mother they were chatting with offered to go with and supervise, to Clarke couldn't say no. That left her and Raven sitting in the grass. They decided they would mingle, and Clarke secretly wanted another cookie. They were simply sinful.

After meeting a few more people, the two women meandered over to the buffet again, bothing wanting more sweets. Raven noticed Bellamy and unknowingly guided Clarke over to him, his sister, and another guy. "Bologna, how's it going?" Raven greeted the man in a cheeky way.

Octavia looked at Raven like she didn't approve, but Bellamy laughed and it lightened her up.

"Raven. This is my sister Octavia and her boyfriend, Lincoln." Bellamy introduced the new man to them, and Octavia to Raven. Raven eyed Lincoln, her eyes going wide a bit and then she grinned knowingly to Octavia, who returned the grin. Her face read how much pride she had in the beefcake she called her boyfriend, and anyone with eyes could appreciate his beauty.

"Nice to meet you." Raven finally said. Lincoln also shook both girls hands very kindly. "We were just here to steal last minute treats." Raven boldly confessed.

"So was Bellamy." Octavia nudged her brother and laughed. He shrugged, innocently. In his hand, Clarke noticed Bellamy had one of their pies and had already bit into it. Raven noticed it too, and something sinister clicked in her head. "Oh hey, hows the pie?" She asked. Clarke looked, waiting for his approval.

He held the small pie up and bit into it, smiling to answer. "Oh good. Clarke, you see that? He enjoyed your pies." She said.

He nodded and looked to her. "Your pie is really good." Raven snorted instantly, and Octavia also tried to muffle a laugh. Both Bellamy and Clarke took a moment to catch the joke and they both rolled their eyes before laughing. Clarke on the other hand had pinked over.

"Smooth, Raven." She elbowed her friend, glaring at her. Raven was saved when Madi came into view around the building, returning from the playground with a few girls around her age. Clarke smiled at the site, glad her daughter had made new neighborhood friends. The girl ran up to her moments later and slid into her side.

"Hey kid, just in time. We were going to steal some cookies and bail." She smiled. Madi looked up, surprised and Clarke looked unamused.

"If you're looking for the chunky ones, they are all gone." Octavia pouted.

"Damnit, those were so good." Raven said as Octavia elbowed Bellamy.

"Thanks." He said dryly.

"Oh, you made those? They were amazing." Clarke smiled, returning the compliment he gave her pies. He nodded.

"We actually have more inside."

"We do?!" Octavia lit up.

"I wouldn't bake you cookies, and you not get any. Come on, O." He nudged her.

"You're the best." She said.

"I know."

"Can we keep him?" Madi looked at Clarke and the sense of humor in this kid would be the death of her. She blushed and laughed awkwardly, but Raven found it hilarious.

"How about we swap, some cookies for pie?" Octavia offered, and Clarke nodded. She noticed her dish wasn't empty, and there were six pies left. She moved from the group and grabbed the dish.

"Want to help me get the cookies?" Octavia asked the girl, who looked to Clarke for approval. She nodded, handing Madi the dish who went with Octavia to Bellamy's apartment. That left Raven and her to chat with Lincoln and Bellamy.

"So, was that your little sister?" Bellamy asked between finishing off his pie.

"Oh, she's my daughter." Clarke shook her head, almost embarrassed. She could sense Bellamy didn't believe her, most people didn't.

He hesitated, trying to plan what to say. Raven was watching closely. "She's adorable." Clarke smiled as his compliment. "She knows." They all laughed lightly. Madi reappeared with Octavia a few minutes later with the dish and a bag of cookies. Clarke took them from her.

"Why don't you run home and clean up, we'll be right in for movie night." Clarke suggested and Madi obliged.

"Well, thank you for the cookies, and again it was nice meeting you both." Clarke said to Octavia and Lincoln.

"I don't mind sharing." Octavia smiled and winked, knowing that the kid would love the cookies.

"Madi will probably eat them all if I let her." She laughed and Raven chimed in. "I'll probably eat them first." She grinned.

"I'm sure Bellamy could make more if it was that dire." Octavia jokes. "It was lovely meeting you two too, and Madi is super charming."

"Thank you." Clarke beamed. "Alright, we should go before she burns the house down." They all smiled and Clarke and Raven turned and went home. In the front door, Raven felt the need to poke Clarke.

"He loves your pie." She exaggerated, and slid out of slapping range in the right time. Clarke rolled her eyes.


	7. Chapter 7

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

 _Wwwrrrrrrrrrr. Wwwrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr._

"What the fuck." Clarke stormed into her room, having followed the obnoxious and loud sound through the house. Stepping into the room, she instantly knew the source. Turning her nose up, she looked to the white ceiling fan that spun slowly and was shattering her very eardrums in that moment. She quickly slid her hand over the switch on the wall, turning the broken device off. The lack of sound was an instant relief until the annoyance of having to fix or replace the fan set in. Scanning her room quickly she surveyed the art she had laying out drying. Not a few hours ago she had worked on some new prints for her online shop and was letting the layers dry. Gnawing on her lip, she checked that her window was wide open and grumpily sought out her wallet. Finding it, she sighed and took off. Clarke decided she needed to solve the problem now, since she didn't have anything better to do.

Back from the store, Clarke dropped the heavy box on her bed and shed herself of her flats. After fetching the tools she would need, she pulled a sheet out of the closet and draped it over the area under old fan, which fell just half on her bed and half on her floor. Clarke then climbed on to her bed and looked up. This is how Clarke found herself as a damsel in distress, so to speak.

Fifteen minutes after she had begun the project of replacing the dying ceiling fan, she was stuck standing on her bed, legs wobbling and arms giving out. She had unfastened it to the point that only one bracket was holding the entire center piece to the ceiling. All of the blades were off and on the floor, as well as the shade and bulb. All was well until the bracket broke. Normally it would anchor the piece as you disconnected or connected wires. Clarke caught it, and held the piece up as high as she could, just out of reach of the wires that were still connected. She couldn't drop the piece, it would rip the wires and fuck everything up.

Home alone, Clarke struggled to figure out what to do next. Part of her thought to just drop it and deal with the repercussion if the wires got ripped out of the ceiling. Standing there stretched to her max and straining while she thought things through took its toll after about ten minutes. As if the universe knew she needed help, she heard a familiar screen door echo between the two buildings behind her and it dawned on her she may be able to ask for help by calling out the window.

"Bellamy!?" She hollered.

* * *

Bellamy was glad to get off work early today, because it was a nice warm day and he wanted nothing to do with the new batch trainees he had. Luckily he was relieved from work for the day because they had a few too many people security personal on staff for the day and Bellamy being one of the lead agents got to go home to let the peons deal with the new guys.

Home after a stop at the grocery store, Bellamy trotted up to his front door and peeled the ricketty screen door away from the house while fumbling with his keys. Finally finding the key he stopped, and thought he heard someone calling out his name. He was confused and waited a moment, silently. It happened again.

"Bellamy!" The sound was quiet, but it was for sure happening. He slid the key into the lock and looked around before opening the door. He heard it again, this time louder and familiar. It dawned on him that he knew the voice.

"Clarke?" He asked, loudly. He questioned, looking over to her house. He could barely make out her figure, the back of her, in the window upstairs. It was too bright outside to see into the room clearly, but he assumed it was her.

Sounding relieved, she spoke up again. "Oh thank fuck." He heard her say quietly. "Could you help me? I'ma kind of stuck." She asked. Amused, Bellamy looked down to his sack of groceries. "Uh yeah, give me a minute." He said, opening his door.

"I mean like, now." She said, a bit urgently. Bellamy took her seriously, opened the door and set his groceries down just inside the door. He slid his keys into his pocket and let the screen door shut.

"Alright, I'm coming now." He hollered back to her and he began to jog across the lawn.

"Hey, Bellamy?" She yelled. "You uh.. Have to climb through the front left window." she added lowly, hoping he would still be in ear shot. Bellamy was so confused, but it made him worry a bit. He picked up the pace and around to the front of her house. Two large windows were right behind a giant bush, which he would clearly need to get around. He slid between the bush and wall and popped her screen off. Checking his back, he made sure no one was watching because it would seem odd to find a man climbing into the window. With the screen off, he jiggled the window and it opened smoothly. Shaking his head, he brushed off how bad this looked and boosted himself into the window, sliding through and falling onto the bare floor beneath it. Closing the window behind himself, he looked to the stairs.

Once upstairs, he found himself in front of her bedroom door, which was open enough to show her standing stretched on her bed, holding up a fan above her. He almost laughed, but hid it with a smile on his face anyways.

"Uh…" He said.

Clarke sighed, looking at him. "I'm stuck here." She explained quickly.

"What do you need me to do?" He asked, moving into the room and ready to help her. He could tell she was stressed out and her limbs were shaking. He wanted to scoop her up and get her down but he could tell that wasn't going to work or she would have dropped the fan.

"A bracket broke on the fan before I could get the wires undone, so it's still wired and if I move it will fall and ruin everything." Her words fumbled around, but made sense to him. He used that simple explanation to jump into action. Sliding his shoes off, he had the courtesy to not step on her bed with them on. He moved to her side and looked up.

"Did you kill the breaker before you did this?" He asked, curious if the wires were still live.

Clarke looked guilty for a moment, then shook her head. "No."

"Alright, I'm going to climb up and help, just don't move okay?" He said. Bellamy stepped on her bed and lifted himself up easily, trying to not jolt her position and make her fall. He moved behind her and reached up, one hand taking taking the weight of the fan engine and the other hovering behind her back.

"I've got it. Let your arms down slowly, I've got you." His voice quiet. His arm snaked around her front gently and he created a brace for her body with his behind her. Watching her, she lowered her arms with a cry of pain and her legs buckled. Every muscle in his arm went into work to keep her upright as she slumped forward a bit. She quickly regained her stability, and slid down his legs, sitting on her own bed. Clarke rubbed her arms and held them to her for a moment, letting the blood correct it's flow. She had been standing there strained far too long. She scooted over and turned up to him.

"Thank you so much. Can we just bolt it back in and give up?" She asked. He chuckled. "No, not with that piece broken. Take a minute, relax. If I get electrocuted, call 911." He joked and reached his other hand up. He quickly uncapped the wires and unconnected each one in order. With it unwired he tucked the now free base under his arm, and stepped back before dropping to his knees on the bed and sliding off of it, standing up. He set the old piece down on floor where the sheet was. Without even asking, he flipped the box upright that held the new fan and pulled a pocket knife out of his pocket, slicing through the tape.

"Oh, you don't have to do that." Clarke said going to stand up. Bellamy raised a hand, beckoning her to stay seated.

"I know I don't have to, but I'm going to. How long were you standing there?" He asked as he pulled out each piece and a bag of screws and bolts.

"I don't know, like ten minutes?" She guessed. He tucked the knife back into his pocket after opening any other packaging in the box, and moved over to where she sat on the bed.

"Here." He reached out and gently took her arm into his hands, which seemed huge holding her thin arm. She looked confused, her arm in his hands, but he kneaded the skin and it relieved her pain enough to cause a flicker of pleasure to wash over her face. He rolled the shoulder joint gently in his hand, and kneaded her upper muscles before switching arms and giving the same treatment to the other.

"Good as new?" He asked, and she nodded.

"Good, you can help me." He said before moving back to the side of the bed under the hole in the ceiling. Bellamy climbed up onto the bed and grabbed the new fans base before righting himself. He reached up and felt the old bracket mount, to make sure that hadn't broken. Luckily, it hadn't, so the fan latched into the clip perfectly which allowed him to not have to hold it and use both of his hands to fix the wires back up. Clarke stood at his legs and would hand up anything he asked for as he asked for it. The job was done in less than ten minutes, and he hopped off her bed and helped her clean up.

As hes cleaning, he filled the silence. "So, you're an artist?" He asked.

"You could say that." She said between picking up trash and stuffing it in the box.

"You've got some good work." He gestured to the table. Clarke looked over.

"Oh, yeah. Those aren't my normal thing, they are for new prints for online." She explained. "I sell online, posters are one of my biggest sellers which is great because they are easy to mass produce. I paint up one copy, and print out the rest." She shrugged.

"That's awesome, it's beautiful work. What is your normal thing, as you said?" He asked.

Finished cleaning up, Clarke moved around the room, scooching past him to the other side of the desks and pulled a very large sketch book from under the desk and flipped up the cover. She handed the large book over to him and he looked at it, in awe. Before him was the most stunning portrait of Raven in what he assumed was charcoal.

"Wow, gorgeous."

"Yeah she is."

"No, I meant you're talent." He smiled. "This is stunning work." He flipped up another page, and saw another portrait of someone he didn't know. She reached for it back before he could get any deeper.

"Thank you."

"Of course, do you sell these?" He asked.

"Rarely, I'll take commissions. I've done a few, but people have such insane expectations. They are very detailed, and take a long time for me to do. I prefer doing those portraits because I want to, but they do make a good pay check when I accept commission on them." She shrugged to her own thoughts.

"I'll bet, a lot of art is like that, more enjoyable when it's what you want to do rather than what you have to do. That is how so many pieces of literature were born."

Clarke looked at Bellamy in awe, seemingly surprised by his words. He looked away at her blue eyes piercing into him.

"Anyways, I'll trash this for you on my way out and put your screen back in." He suggested, heading for the door. In the hallway, he stopped and noticed the door knob to his left was hanging loosely from the door it was connected to. "Hey hand me the phillips." He called over his shoulder casually. Clarke appeared with it, and handed it to him.

"Mind if I open this door?" He asked, looking down at her. She shook her head, and opened it for him revealing Madi's room.

"Wow, did you do that too?" He asked, looking up at the galaxy covered ceiling.

"Yep, Madi loves it." She smiled.

"Hell, I would too." He laughed before kneeling down at the door and adjusting instantly taking the screwdriving to the screws. He tightened the doorknob and giggled it, hearing how perfectly taught it now was.

"Thank you." Clarke said.

"Not a problem." He said, standing back up. They were very close to one another, and it was alluring but awkward. He cleared his throat and handed her the screwdriver, before turning around with the box of trash and old pieces. "So, how old is Madi, if you don't mind my asking." He said, noticing photos of her on the wall as he walked down the stairs.

"She's twelve." Clarke said following him down the stairs.

"Oh." He didn't mean to make the sound, but it escaped him and he instantly felt awkward. He could see Clarke's face sour in the reflection of the giant mirror across the stairwell.

"Sorry, I didn't me-"

"No, it's okay. She's not biologically mine. I adopted her when she was six." Clarke explained, a friendly smile replacing the sour that had appeared previously. Bellamy nodded.

"That's really sweet." He said.

"Yeah, her mom had passed. I've known her since she was about to turn three. She may not be mine, but I love her as if I had her myself." She smiled, as they landed at the bottom of the stairs and Bellamy went to open the door.

"Seems she's got a good mom." He smiled at Clarke.

"Thank you."

Bellamy smiled, and opened the screen door, turning to face her as she stood in the main doorway. "Next time, turn the breaker off." He grinned.

She smiled. "Thank you for saving the day, I really appreciate it."

"Right time, right place."

They smiled at one another, and he turned to leave.

"Hey Bellamy," She took a step forward. "I'll return the favor some time." He looked back at her, and grinned before he stepped away. He put the screen back in her window, threw out the box of old fan parts and finally got back to his groceries and to enjoy the rest of his day off. Naturally, he did spend the rest of that day thinking about his blond neighbor.


	8. Chapter 8

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

Shorty for you guys, sorry. Very hard week for me, taking care of a sick parent and being sick myself. I need a massive hug right now.

* * *

Music filtered through the open window and outside into bright open space of the day. Clarke was currently dancing around to the song currently on the radio, poised before her two desks and an easel. Before her was laid out a series of paintings she had been working on for the better part of two weeks. They were just now coming to conclusion and she had spread them out and rearranged them four times before decided on print order for the series as well as any final touches to the pieces. Content with her decision, she had let them sit there drying while working on a new piece. Her sketchbook was sitting on her easel right now, as she was dancing out some energy. On the white page had been the outline of a man. Not enough detail was put in yet to define who it was, but the fire burning in Clarke drove her to sketch the figure.

Intermission was over when the radio ticked over to some crappy commercial, pulling Clarke from her fun. She stretched out her short figure and planned to dive back into her art when her stomach let out a primal growl that vibrated through her body and up to her throat. She grumbled at the sudden hunger. Dusting her hands off, she navigated around her desk, out the door and downstairs to the kitchen. After washing her hands, Clarke fixed herself a salad and pulled out some sushi she had bought as it was her favorite thing to eat. Lunch was spent on the floor in front of the sofa, something she would never let Madi do. Oh the joy of breaking your own rules when your kid isn't around.

After cleaning up and returning to her room, Clarke fell into her art. Hours had floated away and turned into a blur of peaceful creation. Studiously, she sank into an artistic trance. Her charcoal left the page only when it needed to, and she carefully mapped out the lines of his exquisite human she was forming. Every little detail imaginable coming to life through one of the hardest mediums to do detailed work with. It was as if Clarke had become a printer, her very brain a tool of photography, capturing the likeness of her subject in vivid detail. An artist by nature, it would flow out of her like pure energy and turn into a masterpiece. Admittedly, Clarke made her best money off of her portraits but this one, this one was different. Without even stepping back and looking at the piece as a whole, she knew this one was different. She felt different creating it. There was so much more to this one piece that time just ceased to be a thing as the creation came to life before her.

"Clarkey…" A soft sing-song voice spoke out over the music and lull of her concentration. She didn't budge. It wasn't until moments later when arms wrapped around her shoulders that she was snapped out of her trance, and pulled away from her work. Her black tinged hand went to embrace back the small arms, and quickly got a groan.

"Gross." Madi said.

"Oh hush." Clarke said looking back to her kid. She turned away from her easel and kissed the girls cheek. She posed to ask how the girls day was but wasn't given a chance as Madi was eyeing the art before her, and looked dumbfounded.

"Wow." Madi said.

Clarke was a bit confused, and looked back to her own art. _Oh, shit._ Clarke hadn't realized how much work she had put into this piece, let alone who she was drawing this entire time. A dusting of pink speckled her face, and she grabbed the book flipping a page over that one to hide the work.

"Uh." She couldn't find a word, feeling awkward that she had done that.

"That was amazing." Madi said, in the most serious tone a twelve year old could manage. It was lost quickly though as the girl turned on a sinister grin and equally knowing stare. Madi had complimented the quality of work Clarke put in, but now wanted to focus on the content of said piece.

"So, when's the wedding?" She playfully goaded her mother before leaping out of grasp as to avoid any kind of tickling punishment. She laughed and ran out of the room, which lead Clarke to chase her. They ended up downstairs and Madi was cornered in the kitchen. She pleaded to not be tickled, but Clarke closed in.

"You're lucky my hands are so dirty." She relented, and poked the girls nose with a charcoal covered finger. Madi cringed, only to smile moments later. Clarke went to the sink and washed her hands and arms off, Madi joined her while the water was still on.

"I didn't even realize I was drawing him." Clarke defended herself.

"So, he doesn't know you're drawing him?"

Clarke blushed and in that moment was utterly annoyed by how intelligent and mature her twelve year old really was. It was the same calibre of harassment Raven would give her, if she had caught her instead of Madi.

"Go do your homework, butt." Clarke ruffed up the girls hair. "Burgers for dinner!"

Madi did a little victory dance about the dinner exclamation before skipping off to her room to do as she was told. Left alone now at the sink, Clarke found herself looking out the window blankly, her eyes on the house of the very man she somehow drew. Subconsciously, she was drawn to him and maybe that very allure is what lead her to drawing Bellamy. As she stood there in a daze yet again, she wondered why she drew him. She wondered how he would have reacted if he knew, or he saw it. Would he like it? Would she be the biggest creep of the century for randomly sketching the most detailed portrait of her career that also happened to be her incredibly good looking neighbor. The hot water reaching a new level of heat brought her back from her daze as she yanked her hand away from the tap and turned the water off. Turning, her back was now to the window and she wondered a moment longer before drying her hands off and setting off to prepare dinner.


	9. Chapter 9

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

"Did you really just do that?" Bellamy's voice playfully and Octavia were playing darts on a new board Bellamy had bought. He had set it up in a safe corner of the living room, where no one would get peppered with darts. It was also backed on a cork board that Octavia had painted black and trimmed with a white frame to make it look nice. He stood stunned as he had watched his sisters dart fly effortlessly into the center of the board, making her the winner. She had thrown all three of her darts in the dead center of the board without so much as a flinch of effort. She smugly smiled at her brother, and plucked the sharp objects out of the board. "Looks like you're cooking dinner." She pat his shoulder like the sore loser he was, and walked out from to where Lincoln was sitting on the stoop enjoying sundown.

Bellamy couldn't believe he had been bested by his sister. She was far too cocky if she ever did beat him, and rare as it was, this was a landslide in terms of a victory. He put the darts away and slumped into the kitchen. Opening the fridge, he rummaged. He then spent more time than reasonable in front of the open pantry, scanning his options. It was in that moment that he remember something from work. Bounding up stairs, he grabbed his wallet and checked the contents. "Yes!" He explained.

Moments later he was downstairs and at the front door where the couple sat, Octavia leaning on her boyfriend and both watching the sun begin to set over the expansive peaks off in the distance. It really was breathtaking. The colors and clouds formed what looked to be an autumnal colored batch of cotton candy stretching over the now silhouetted peaks. He opened the door, and O looked up to him. Opening his waller, he slid a stiff piece of paper out and waved it at her with a grin.

"Dinner time."

Octavia turned more, snatching the paper out of his hand. She scanned it, and looked surprised. "What, how the hell did you get this?" She asked. Lincoln also looked to the document, and gave Bellamy the exact same questioning look.

"Work. All managers and above got one." He boasted.

"You're not a manager…" Octavia had to sourly remind him.

"Not on paper, I do the damn work. Anyways, want some fondue?" He asked, turning the topic back on to the paper. It had been a coupon to receive half off of a four-course meal at one of the most popular fondue restaurants in town which happened to be very expensive.

"It says fail only for a party of four." Octavia said the works that quickly spoiled his mood. They didn't have a fourth and they all quickly felt disappointed. Bellamy sat beside his sister on the shallow stoop and looked out, contemplating who they could get as a fourth. He could call his friend Miller, but knew he'd want to bring his boyfriend. Octavia didn't have many friends close by and Lincoln's social circle was the two of them sitting beside him on that very stoop.

"I guess I'll make burgers?" He suggested with a heavy sigh.

Moments of silence passed before Octavia perked up. "Our new neighbor. Maybe she'll be free?" The tone his sister used was sinister at best. He cocked his head at her, and gave her the most disapproving look.

"Yeah, let me go to our new neighbors house and ask her to be our fourth to a fancy restaurant. I'll get right on that, O." He sarcastically said.

She shoved him. "No, seriously. See if her or her roomate are free? If you don't do it, I will. They seemed nice, and you know I don't like other girls."

He knew she had a point. Even Octavia had hit it off with the two new girls, and that was saying something.

"Dammit." He stood up. "She has a kid, you know. She's probably busy."

"Stop making up excuses, I'm hungry. Go." Octavia bossed her big brother around. He rolled his eyes and caught Lincoln laughing as he walked away, down the hill to their neighbors house.

Once he rounded the building, he found himself smacked in the face with the sight of a gorgeous sky blue Firebird. He had to stop and admire the beauty before him almost completely forgetting why he was in front of Clarke's house. Sudden thoughts of who possibly owned that car had filled his mind and he felt like turning back. Out of sight of Octavia, he could still feel her glare on him as if she could see through the building. He continued on and found himself knocking lightly on her door, as if to get away with not doing this.

It didn't work. The blonde peeled the door open and smiled upon seeing Bellamy on her stoop. She pushed open the screen door and leaned on the jamb. She stood before him in a loose and very used pair of rolled up blue jeans and an oversized light grey t-shirt that hung off her body in just the right way. She looked so messy and adorable all in one. "Hey, Bellamy."

"Hey." He woke himself up to the conversation. "I've got a coupon for this fondue place and we need a fourth, O wanted to see if you were available?" He spat out the words very casually but a bit quickly. She looked down and sighed.

"I wish, but I'm elbow-deep in a commission that is due to be shipped by the weekend and Madi has a the flu." She explained, her face displaying clear disappointment. Bellamy frowned.

"I'm sorry to hear about Madi, I hope she gets better soon."

"Thanks." She said before thinking a moment. "Oh, you know what, I bet Raven would love to go." She suggested, standing up right from her lean. She backed away from the door for a moment, not even letting Bellamy protest. She moved the door and called behind it loudly.

"Ray!" She looked back to Bellamy with a smile to keep him engaged, and moments later the brunette came bounding down the stairs and into the view of the door. "Oh hey neighbor man."

"Raven, Bellamy need's a fourth for a coupon. You like fondue, right?" She asked. Raven lit up.

"I love that shit."

"Perfect. Bellamy, you have a fourth." She smiled. Bellamy returned the smile but part of him felt disappointed that it was Raven and not Clarke tagging along. He couldn't figure out why, but he didn't linger on the thought.

"Awesome, if you're ready now Raven, we'll head out?" He offered.

"Of course, let me grab my jacket." And she did, finding a cropped red jacket to fit over her otherwise plain outfit. Raven moved passed Clarke and kissed her cheek. "Be back later."

Clarke beamed at her friend, and watched her walk out with Bellamy who turned away from the door to escort Raven to Octavia and Lincoln. He bid a farewell to Clarke and they passed the blue beauty one more time. He realized in that moment with Raven being a mechanic, it was probably hers. "Hey, is this yours?" He asked, gesturing to the old car. Raven laughed.

"No way. She's a beauty, but I would never drive a Firebird if I wanted to. Clarke doesn't let anyone touch her." She looked up to him and chuckled. It was Clarkes? Bellamy suddenly found himself wanting to know more about his blond neighbor.


	10. Chapter 10

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

I'd like to state really quickly, again, that I know I am less than consistent in my posting. February was a difficult month for me. I try to post a new chapter every week to two weeks and honestly some times it may take me a little longer. One thing I will promise you is that I will NEVER abandon a story. You will always get a completed story from me, and if you have to message me and say "Hey woman, let's go" I'm totally down. So please rest assured, I may be slow at times but I will not leave you hanging for months, years, or abandon any of my stories. Ever!

* * *

After Raven had gone to dinner with Bellamy, Octavia, and Lincoln, they had really hit it off and the houses decided to spend more time together. Octavia started coming over randomly and hanging out with the girls. Madi especially took to her, as after school the two would go outside and exercise together which Clarke loved. It was safe and a great workout while Octavia taught her self defense. Of course, Clarke would watch closely to make sure Madi wasn't subjected to violence or anything overly extreme. Madi was having so much fun and the days she spent a few hours with Octavia, she would sleep so hard that night. It really was a great addition to the young girls day. Raven and Clarke took to her as well. The three would drink wine and watch TV some nights, dishing about their days. Sadly, Clarke never really had much to dish on.

It was a friday night and Madi was nuzzled into the only side chair in the room. Lincoln and Bellamy were sitting on the couch with Raven, while Clarke and Octavia were on the floor, their back against the couch. Octavia had come over earlier in evening to work out with Madi and teach her something new. They didn't last long before Madi had somehow convinced Octavia and Clarke to cook together. They both had so much fun in the kitchen, and ended up making enough food for a small army so Clarke had suggested Octavia's boys come over and the night had turned into a little event.

The TV boomed with an action sequence, and Clarke quickly looked over to Madi who barely stirred. She resigned to needing to take the girl upstairs, but at twelve, she wasn't easy to carry anymore. Bellamy must have caught on, because he tapped her shoulder gently and gave a nod. Words weren't needed, and she understood. Both Clarke and Bellamy stood, Bellamy moving over to the chair and leaning down. He effortlessly scooped the pre-teen into his arms and Clarke lead him up stairs, opening Madi's door for them when needed. Clarke stood at the door as Bellamy moved past her and gently set the kid down on her bed. He innately went to cover her himself, as if he didn't even think about it. It warmed Clarke's heart, but she tried to not show that. Bellamy left the room and Clarke closed the door behind them.

"Thank you." She smiled softly at him.

"No problem." He began heading back down the stairs. "How's your art going?" He asked, waiting for her to go first down the stairs. He was always letting women go first, it was natural.

Stepping down the stairs in front of him, she hesitated for a moment, wondering if Madi had mentioned that she may or may not have created something with him as the subject. She suddenly got nervous. "Uh really great." She finally replied.

"That's awesome, I'm glad to hear."

At the bottom of the stairs, she looked back to him. "What about you? What do you do for work?" She asked.

"You know the resort and casino up in the mountain?"

"Yeah, uh, Eden's Pass?" Clarke tried to remember the name. Bellamy nodded though, confirming she was right.

"I'm one the lead security agents there."

"So, you're like a bouncer?" She asked.

Shrugging, he explained. "We do a lot, monitor the casino, take reports and calls from guests, run security for events and generally police the grounds. We have a really big team and I'm one of the superior under the management."

"Oh that's cool." She replied, as the two rounded the threshold back into the living room. They seperated and Bellamy took his seat back on the sofa. Octavia had moved on to the sofa next to Lincoln, and Raven beside her. Clarke took the side chair Madi had once occupied and the adults all enjoyed the rest of their movie with the occasional snack, drink refill, or dad-joke to break through the intense action movie.

After the movie had finished, the group went their separate ways with Octavia and the boys going home. Raven had slinked off to bed, and Clarke was left cleaning the kitchen. She more or less wanted to and felt the need to get it done so she too could climb into her bed. It didn't take her long as they had already done all of the dishes, or loaded them into the washer. She just wanted to clean up from their little movie night. Once satisfied, Clarke found her way to her room and stretched her body out behind closed doors as she almost always did. Before shedding any clothing though, she couldn't help but be drawn to look out her window.

Bellamy stood in what Clarke would assume to be the smaller room, much how Madi's was in their house. He was shirtless and lifting weights, his back to the window. He seemed to be watching something on the monitor on the desk but she couldn't make out what it was. Unknowingly, Clarke found herself gnawing on her lip as she watched the tan muscles flex and move under the weight of the barbells he hoisted. He looked so effortless and strong. Only a minute or so had passed before she realize how creepy she was being, and she shook her mind to clear from it's stupor. Reaching behind her, she flipped the light off and proceeded to change into a flimsy tank and shorts to sleep in. Clarke climbed into bed after one more glance, and went to sleep.

The next day, Clarke woke up later than she normally did. Raven or Madi would have been in to wake her long about, but neither had. In fact, when she finally peeled herself out of the bed and downstairs, the house was empty and it sent worry through her core. Luckily, Raven had left a note on the fridge that read:

 _"Took Little Boss to the Zoo with Sinclair and his family, hope you didn't forget! - Ray"_

Clarke sighed, feeling stupid for having forgot. Raven's boss had offered to take all three of them to the zoo with his family weeks ago. In that moment it had dawned on her that she was left behind because she had a meeting to go to and that too had lapsed her mind. She looked at the clock and suddenly felt frantic, she had less than an hour to get read and get downtown to meet with a local gallery that wanted to display some of her personal pieces. They featured a new artist every month and wanted Clarke to be on the roster.

Scrambling herself together, she grabbed a banana and scarfed it down while she ran back upstairs and flicked on the shower. Nothing happened. _What the fuck?_ She tried again, and again, to no avail. Then she tried the sink, again, no water. Angry, she looked out front and saw a piece of paper on the glass of her screen door. Her face was nothing shy of stone cold as she opened the door and plucked the paper off, reading it.

"Water will be off until around 4PM. We have a plumber out doing some work, sorry for any inconvenience this may cause." The note was signed "Unit #3". So, the entire building didn't have water and Clarke needed to go. She was not about to have an important meeting without showering. She couldn't even sink-bathe at this point, so she weighed her options as she went back upstairs. Clarke was angry, but she had to think fast. Grabbing some clean clothes, her phone and the house key, she locked the door behind her and swallowed deeply as she headed for her last hope; Bellamy.

Walking up to the building behind hers, she hoped one of them was home. It was a Saturday after all, so the odds were in her favor. She knew this would be weird, but what choice did she have? At first, she gently knocked on the door but it yielded no reply. She chalked that up to her being too quiet, so she rang the bell. Moments later she heard loud steps booming down the stairs inside the home, and it quickly followed with Bellamy swinging the door open.

* * *

Bellamy had a headset on and was gaming when he heard the annoying tone of his doorbell go off. He quickly peeled the headset off of his head and clodded down the stairs to see who it was. To his surprise, when he opened the door Clarke stood before him clad in a scant amount of clothing, her hair tousled and her face stressed. In her hand was a bundle of clothing that just made him look at her with a questioning brow.

"Uh, hey Clarke?" He said, opening the screen door and taking a step out.

"Hey, I know this is weird but my building doesn't have water and I have to get downtown like, now. Could I uh.. " She hesitated and looked down. "... borrow your shower?"

Bellamy couldn't stop the grin that crept across his stupidly handsome face when he saw how bashful she was about the request. Part of the smile was also probably the thought of this vixen being naked in his shower, but he wouldn't admit that if he knew that outright.

She looked back to his eyes, and blushed but it quickly turned to annoyance. She didn't seem to appreciate his amusement in the situation. Before she could snark at him, he steeled his face.

"That sucks, about the water. But yeah, sure. Come on in." He moved aside and ushered her into the home. She looked around as if she was comparing their homes. She didn't look disappointed or anything, just as if she was drinking it in.

"Just up here." Bellamy pointed up the stairs, where he let her go first. Clarke walked up the steps just ahead of him, enough steps in front of him that her curvy figure would line up with his view effortlessly. He noted how thin and barely-there her top was previously, as she clearly had no bra on. But now he was noticing she also lacked underwear, as no lines shone beneath the pale blue fabric of her shorts. They fit her perfectly, and he would be lying if he didn't love the view. Her sway as she climbed his stairs, and the jiggle of her heart shaped ass. Bellamy had to look down to keep himself from drooling.

At the top of the stairs, he moved around her swiftly and opened a linen closet. He pulled out a fresh towel for her, and handed it to her along with a matching washcloth. Stepping into the bathroom with her, he quickly showed her the knobs. It was different from hers, that he knew as he had seen her shower in passing the day they moved her in. Clarke's bathroom was an open, and high tub. Bellamy's was a bit shallower and had an old 70's sliding glass door.

"Use anything you want, Octavia's products are down in the right corner, if you want the girly stuff." He smiled, and she rolled her eyes.

"Don't fall in." He said, a habit he and Octavia had formed over the years to goad one another. Clarke looked at him a bit, but then smiled and pushed him out of the bathroom. She didn't thank him, she said nothing. She just shut the door with a grin on her face and it left him borderline hungry for more. He stood there for a moment, and when he heard the shower turn on, he walked back into his gaming room and sat at his desk. To get his mind off of the remarkable woman that was naked and wet only feet away from him, he put his headset back on and turned on some loud music.

Minutes later, Clarke emerged from the steamy bathroom and found herself in the doorway of the room he was in, which easily caught his attention. His eyes scanned every inch of her body as she was now fully clothed and looked stunning. She wore a white blouse that had a low cut in the front, trimmed in black. It wasn't revealing at all somehow, but so sexy. Her long legs were being hugged by a tight black fabric. She was leaning her head into the towel in her hands as she tried to mop up any moisture from her wet wavy locks. Her hair so messed and wet made him bite his lip.

"You mind if I borrow your towel?" She asked quietly, as he shed the headset off.

"Nope, not at all." He said, standing.

"You're a lifesaver, again." She moved in and wrapped her arms around him. This was a first. He was slightly taken aback, but he didn't let it show. He gently hugged her back and with her warm body in his arms, he took in her scent. A warmth wormed through his entire body and into his very soul when he realized she had used his product, and now she smelt of him. He wondered if she knew that, or had just randomly chosen.

Clarke pulled back and smiled.

"I'll bring it back later, washed." She moved back to the bathroom and gathered the rest of her clothing. Her feet barely made a sound, bare on the linoleum.

"No rush. You can shower here anytime you need." He laughed.

"Hopefully my neighbors fix their shit. Who shuts off the water on a saturday?" She scoffed and the two headed downstairs. Clarke opened the front door for herself, and Bellamy pulled it open more.

"Alright, I've got to jet. Thanks again Bell." She beamed. His heart melted. That name was something only Octavia had ever used, and never had he heard it sound so right. His face went from doe-eyed to a rigid smile as he was confused about his own thoughts and feelings. She quickly leaned in and popped a ghost of a kiss on his freckled cheek before walking out the door and running home. It happened so fast, he stood there like a dumbass and a grin had taken over. Shutting the door after she was out of site, he bound back up the stairs to his room. The entire upstairs smelled of her, or him, or the shower. Well, all three, and it smelled really good. Back at his desk, he sat down yet again and resorted to music to distract the growing… attraction on his mind.


	11. Chapter 11

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

Clarke made it to her appointment on time and in style. As she collected her composure, she walked into the gallery. The current display was very old-world, showing off pieces that existed many generations before her. Taking in they view displays, she was nearly caught off guard when she heard her name.

"Miss Griffin?" A soft but authoritative voice called out. Clarke turned to the woman, a slender and slightly taller woman came into Clarke's view. She put on her best smile and moved to greet the woman, her hand extended.

"That's me. It's nice to meet you, Mrs. Wallace." The handshake was firm and confident.

"Likewise, I see you were taking in this months display." She woman gestured around them.

Clarke nodded. "It's remarkable."

"I agree. So, Miss Griffin, did you bring a portfolio for me?" The woman asked, and Clarke nodded.

"I have both a digital and hard-copy." The woman looked surprised or impressed with the option, and smiled to Clarke.

"Follow me to my office, we can pull up your digital."

The women walked through the long, narrow building. The floor was a pristinely kept hardwood in just the perfect mid-tone brown. The walls were all a flat grey with a thick white base trim. The portable walls that would come and go for different exhibits were currently a deep red trimmed in a very thick rich moulding. It suited the style of the exhibit perfectly without taking away from any of the art. The building felt so very warm and cozy despite the clean lighting.

As they reached a door that matched the wall almost a bit too well in the back of the building. Pushing it open revealed a stairwell that split both up and down to different levels. Clarke was a bit taken off guard by this, but the woman ushered her to the left which lead up.

"We have three floors to the building." She began explaining as they ascended the stairs. "Upstairs is where my office is and where I work on my side business as a conservator. Downstairs is storage and intake for pieces."

Clarke smiled and nodded, listening to the details. It made sense, the building was taller than she anticipated. Finally at the top of the stairs, Mrs. Wallace held open a glass door, and let Clarke go in before her. The room was massive, or it felt that way with the open layout compared to the one a floor lower. The walls were crisp white, the floors a sealed concrete. The aesthetic of this floor was much different from the gallery. It seems that not much was changed from the bare-bones of the building, outside of personal touches. Clarke looked around and noticed how very sterile-meets-industrial the room was, except for one seating area off in the corner. Even Mrs. Wallace's desk was just glass and metal. Though there were two enormous work tables in the middle of the room, like something you would see in a high school art class. Processing everything, Clarke got lost in her thoughts.

"Welcome to the Loft." She smiled to the blonde, as if she were proud of her own office.

"I like it." She smiled, looking back to the other woman who had now walked over to that aforementioned corner Clarke had noticed. It was cozy compared to the rest of the large room. In the corner sat a large and well-used fluffy couch in a steel blue hue. Two white armchairs with blue and yellow details in the print sat catty-corner from the sofa and on the wall across the sofa was a massive screen. It looked like part of a sorority house living room had been plopped into the corner of this floor.

Clarke followed Mrs. Wallace, who spun to ask for her thumbdrive. Grinning, Clarke already had it in had and easily handed it over to the woman.

"Please, sit and get comfortable. Can I get you anything to drink?" Mrs. Wallace asked.

"Oh, I'm fine, but thank you." Clarke said, and with that Mrs. Wallace wakled over to her desk. She plugged the drive in and fiddled with things before the cover page of the portfolio appeared on the screen. The windows drew closed as if a button was pressed to block out light, and the woman returned. Clarke had sat on the couch, and the woman decided to sit beside her on it, but on the other end.

"So, we can do this any way you want. I can go through it and just pick things out and talk about them, or you can take control and show me what you want me to see." She posed a decision to Clarke that would easily jostle most in an interview, but not Clarke.

"Oh that's perfect. I'd love to take the lead on this." She smiled, sitting up a bit. Mrs. Wallace handed over a little remote that would allow her to control the progression of the portfolio and Clarke felt like she needed to stand and present it to the class. She had to remind herself, this was casual and this wasn't school anymore. She did turn a bit toward the other woman though.

"So as you know, I'm not professionally trained. Growing up I would always be overcome by this need to draw what I saw. Capture the beauty of life in my own way. It became this nagging passion in me and something I relied heavily on through hard times. Because of how important art became to me, I made a career of it. Like I've mentioned before, I sell through Etsy. While I produce a mixed bag the one thing that people request the most, which also happens to be the purpose of my soul is my charcoal portraits." She took a breathe and looked to the screen. A few clicks and it landed on a high resolution photo of a charcoal portrait she had done years ago. It was Madi at the age of five having just been told that her mommy went to heaven. The black and white of the piece added to the pain it displayed. Strands of tousled hair in position as if you were in that very moment of that person's life. Clarke always teared up at that piece, but it was one of her best and most cherished to date.

"Wow." Mrs. Wallace whispered.

"May I ask what you think this one is about?" Clarke dared the woman interviewing her. Mrs. Wallace sat up a bit and leaned forward. She was taking it in silently.

"This portrait was burned into your mind by the pain this little one is going through. You couldn't unsee her heartbreak. I'm assuming something big happened in her life that day." Wallace suggested, and Clarke wiped the rim of her eye.

"Oh, I'm sorry I didn't mean to upset."

"I'm not upset." Clarke smiled. "You're correct though. I used to volunteer at a medical clinic and a patient brought her daughter every time. She became everyone's best friend for years. Her mother was progressively getting sick, and that portrait is the day we had to tell her that her mother went to heaven. She was five."

Mrs. Wallace had a hand to her heart and looked over at Clarke. "You seem to not only have such a deep soul but a real skill. You captured something so painful and made it into a storytelling piece with unbelievable talent."

Clarke smiled and felt appreciated for the first time in a long time. Some see charcoal as a less than appealing art media.

"What happened to the girl?" Mrs. Wallace asked.

Clarke smiled, looked to the screen and used the remote to get to the next one she wanted to display. The screen now showed three side-by-side portraits. On the left was a playful depiction of Madi on an old metal swing set. The left was Raven, leaning up against the end of a metal swing set, and in the middle was a rare thing for Clarke; A self portrait. She was the middle canvas and in it she sat on the swing with the softest grin on her face as it's tilted up toward the sky.

"I adopted her when she was 6. Her name is Madi and she is my daughter. This was the day it was made official, my best friend by our side." Clarke said simply.

Silence filled the room and Mrs. Wallace studied the display and the woman beside her. It was a remarkable story.

"You've got me in a mess here, Miss Griffin." She started.

"Please, call me Clarke."

"Clarke, your story telling in both word and art is unmatched. I'm fighting with myself about how to be professional and friendly right now."

Clarke was worried at that last sentence but the other woman reached over and held her hand.

"What I meant was I'd crack open a bottle of something right now, slip my shoes off and just chat with you all day. Just to get to know more about you and the way you process things because honey, you're an artist. I mean, looking at the art you produce and hearing the basis for why it exists is so very compelling. A lot a art people make you guess, or leave it up to imagination. But you, you're creating little pieces of your soul and memories into art form. I can't get enough."

Clarke smiled and handed the remote back to Mrs. Wallace.

"Please, look through. Some things aren't complete, but I like to show my best, worst, and what is to come." She explained. Wallace did exactly that, she clicked through the slides and had reactions to most. She stopped on one though.

"Oh that's not done." Clarke spat out as fast as she could.

"Something is off with this one." Wallace stood up and marched to the screen. She studied it closer. The silence was unbearable so Clarke stood and moved over. Her chin quivered slightly.

"Your style changed here, somehow. I can't pinpoint it. Something about this one is just ever so slightly different."

"Bad different, or good?" Clarke nipped her lip.

"Good, I think. Looking at this piece, there is an allure to it that is new. Maybe it's the subject, he is handsome. Is this your boyfriend?" She other woman turned back to clarke and smiled.

"Oh, no. He's my neighbor."

"Uh huh."

Clarke was reeling on that last remark. What did she mean by 'uh huh' and what did she mean about how the portrait of Bellamy was different.

"Alright, so here is the plan. I have a room open for the last friday of the month. Same booth size as downstairs. New artist night. I want you in it."

"Seriously? That would be wonderful." Clarke was getting excited.

"So this is what you need to do before then. Prep your work. Go through and pick out your best pieces. Email me photos of them, and email me that portfolio too. I'm not done with it. We'll decide what to display for your first run. If people like you, we go from there. It can be anything. I know you said you're multi talented so don't limit yourself. You don't have to make anything new for this, it's just an introduction to the gallery world." Professional Mrs. Wallace was back on point immediately.

"Okay, yeah. I can do that. Thank you so much for this opportunity, Mrs. Wallace."

The women faced one another and stood.

"Call me Lorelai. You have all my info. New Friday is in two weeks and you have plenty of time. Just keep me posted and we'll get you on the wall and into the world."

Both women were glowing and smiling. "If you want to stick around a few, I can show you around?" Lorelai suggested, reaching out more friendly to Clarke.

"I'd love to." Clarke said.

Lorelai lead Clarke around all three floors of the gallery and gave her an insider take on what it was all about. She got to know about Lorelai's conservation business and how she repairs and restores old pieces. Hours had passed by the time the two women found themselves down at the front door trying to part ways.

"I look forward to seeing what you want to show." Lorelai said. The women shook hands.

"Thank you, for all of this." Clarke smiled.

"Of course. I'll see you later."

The women parted ways and Clarke was high on life at the moment. Happily, she took her time getting home. When she pulled up, someone was parked in her spot which made no sense. Her spot was literally at their front door and it wasn't a car she knew. She pulled around to the mailboxes and parked there. Sitting in her car, she looked over to the one that was in front of her house. She'd sit it out and wait, maybe it was someone selling something and they would leave soon. Her window was rolled down just the slightest, so when a voice boomed beside her it made her entire frame jump out of the old bucket seat.

"Jesus fuck.." She looked over. _Oh._

"Oh, hey." She said. Bellamy laughed and leaned down to be level with the window.

"Didn't mean to scare you, how did your meeting thing go?" He asked, but she had drifted back toward the car in front of her home. Bellamy caught on to her focus.

"Went really well." She said while trying to will that random car out of her spot. Bellamy realized what she was doing, and took off. He ran into her view and disappeared around the corner. She scrambled for her belt, but decided not to follow. A minute or two later, he comes back around the corner and two younger men following behind who then split and go to either side of the car. They quickly and seemingly quietly got into their car and pulled out, parking, leaving.

"Problem solved. So how was that meeting?" He asked, back at the driver side only now Clarke was standing in the open door.

"What did you do?" She asked, almost annoyed.

"They were visiting your neighbors, I saw them pull all smoking on their patio earlier. Told them they need to park in the dirt like all other guests. I guess they were leaving anyways." He shrugged.

"Thanks, I think?" She asked, and slid back into her seat.

"Not in the mood to chat I take it?" He asked.

"Huh?"

"I asked you about your meeting, all I got was 'went really well'." He pointed out.

Clarke relaxed into the seat and sighed.

"Get in, I need ice cream." She said softly. Bellamy didn't hesitate to take the offer, a ride in a classic Firebird with a gorgeous girl. He bound over to the passenger side and slid in, shutting the door with a cautious respect for it. Clarke caught this and laughed. They both buckled up and Clarke backed ou expertly before tossing her phone and beckoning her co-pilot to find the closest Dairy Queen.

...


	12. Chapter 12

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

Clarke drove them to the nearest Dairy Queen in relative silence. The radio streamed music they both seemed to enjoy and a breeze filtered through the window. It was a very relaxing moment. They pulled up to the drive through and Clarke studied the menu.

"Welcome to Dairy Queen, how may I help you?" A voice chirped over the ancient intercom.

"I'll take a medium Salted Caramel Truffle Blizzards, and…" She looked over at Bellamy. He shook his head indicating he didn't want anything. She fired one firm scowl his direction and he quickly changed his mind.

"Hot Fudge Sundae." He said loud enough that the person on the other end of the intercom heard him.

"Will that be all?"

"Oh, and a large fry." She added. The person on the other ende repeated back her order, confirmed it and told her the price and to pull up. She did as told and pulled up to the next window. A teenager repeated the price and order to her. Clarke handed cash to the kid to pay for the meal and received change back. She was then handed a drink caddy with the two treats in it and a small bag with the fries and some napkins. Clarke passed them off to Bellamy who took both items easily into his lap.

"Thank you." She said.

"Have a nice day."

"You too." Clarke bid a sweet smile to the teen and pulled out. She headed back home but took a turn that took Bellamy by surprise.

"Where are we going?" He asked uneasily.

"Don't worry, I'm not kidnapping you. That would be hard." She laughed as she pulled behind the grocery store that was down the road from their condos. She pulled in behind the long strip of commercial buildings and pulled up her beloved car right up to the edge of an overlook. It was small and not as vast as the cliffs of the mountains but they overlooked the creek that ran through the city. It was relaxing for being smack in the middle of an urban cityscape. She shut the car off and got out, looking back at him to do the same.

Clarke pocketed her keys and slid onto the hood of her car. Bellamy grimace so hard she thought he'd vomit at the site and she laughed.

"You won't dent it, Bellamy." She assured him. He handed off the food to her and reluctantly followed suit. He was like a scaling the hood with the utmost grace, for fear of damaging the vintage beauty. He settled in beside her. She set the caddy between them and pulled the fries out of the bag, setting them into an open slot in the drink caddy. After that she laid the napkins down in the fourth empty slot and picked up her blizzard. She carefully spooned off the caramel drippings that covered the top and savored every bit. Comfortable and enjoying the atmosphere, she didn't realize he was watching her. She felt her cheeks pink over when she noticed, and she looked away.

"So, how has your day been?" She asked, realizing it hadn't been that long since they saw one another earlier that day. She had been in his house, in his shower. She fed herself another spoon of the toppings on her blizzard.

"Haven't done much since earlier." He was honest. "Tell me about your meeting already." He laughed.

"Oh, yeah!. I got a spot on a new artists night. They do this event one friday every month where new local artists get a spot. It's casual but it can be huge for your career." She beamed as she spoke of it, feeling very proud today.

"That's awesome, is it a gallery downtown?"

"Yeah, how did you know?" She asked.

"I didn't, we don't really have any galleries in the city so I figured it was downtown." He admitted with a chuckle.

With the lush topping of caramel now removed from the top most layer of her blizzard, Clarke reached down and grabbed a few fries. She dipped them into the ice cream before plucking one out at a time and eating them. The blend of salty and sweet was so perfect on the palette. She realized Bellamy was staring at her as she put an ice cream coated fry into her mouth.

"Can I help you?" She smirked.

"What the actual fuck?" He laughed.

"I'm sorry, what? Have you never dipped your fries in ice cream?" She looked to him with a surprised and almost unapproving look. He shook his head. Grabbing another fry, she dipped it into her blizzard and held it out to him to feed him it. He hesitated but took the fry from her, his lips nearly touching her finger. She could feel the current of energy in the tiny gap between his lips and her fingers. Pulling her hand back, Clarke wiped her finger tips on a napkin beside her while waiting for his verdict on the treat he was experiencing.

"Okay, I understand." He grabbed a fry himself and dipped it in his sundae. "Where did you learn that?"

"My dad taught me that as far back as I can remember. Same for popcorn and softer fast-food ice cream. We used to do it as a skating rink we would visit when I was a kid." She explained before taking a scoop of her sundae into her mouth.

"Clever man." Bellamy nodded in approval. Clarke smiled at the thought.

"That he was."

"Oh -"

Raising her hand to stop him in his thought, she looked at him. "You couldn't have known and honestly, I enjoy talking about my father. He was a great man and it's been almost eleven years." She explained with a soft and sincere smile. The notion that one couldn't discuss the dead was just so foreign to Clarke. She wanted to talk about the man and celebrate his life. It wasn't a wound anymore for her.

"Alright." He nodded. "Am I right in assuming he was a car guy?" Bellamy sheepishly asked.

Laughing, Clarke nodded. "Yep." She cleared her throat from sticky sweet ice cream. "This was his first car purchase and he treated her so well." Clarke lovingly ran a hand on the hood.

"When I was 16 he promised I would get the car when I graduated, under one condition. I had to promise that no matter what I do in life, I let my heart out. He always said I was so headstrong, and he wanted me to be happier and live my best life. I promised and even though he died a year later just before I graduated I still got the car and I kept my promise." Clarke had a soft glow to her as she spoke of her father and Bellamy noticed it as his eyes didn't move away.

"He sounds like an amazing father." Bellamy said. His tone sincere but a hint of resentment displayed. Clarke wondered if Bellamy didn't have a good relationship with his father.

Clarke smiled brightly and continued enjoying her blizzard and fry combination. Bellamy too enjoyed the sweet and salty treat. Of course his sundae was smaller than her blizzard and he ate a bit faster than she. Finishing off his treat quickly, he sat relaxed on the hood of her car as best he could. He still acted like it would break beneath him. Clarke on the other hand leaned back against the windshield as if she had done this many times before. Yet the car was in near perfect condition.

As Clarke enjoyed her blizzard, Bellamy got restless and stole a scoop of ice cream on the end of a fry. She looked at him as if he commit a crime but smiled at him and rolled her eyes. She scooted closer and shared the blizzard with him, knowing she should have ordered a small. The two chatted and ate away at their snack. Clarke learned more about Bellamy's career as security up the mountain. He doted on his sister, and touched on how Lincoln was good for her. Finally he lightly touched on his own parental relationships and the two found themselves bonding more than ever. Time slipped away and the sun sky became more vivid just before it would fall.

"Oh Mads." She said quickly, aware of her motherly obligations as if she had forgotten them. She scooted forward to get herself off the hood.

"We should get you home, huh?" He asked bounding quickly off the hood. He held a hand out to her to help her down. Clarke blushed but looked down and took his hand, letting him help her down.

"Yeah, I should." She instinctively dusted her pants off and moved to the driver side of the car. She jingled the key in her hand, and then looked up to Bellamy.

"Wanna drive?" She smirked suggestively, suspecting he would be surprised.

"Uh, seriously?" He looked dumbfounded but she quickly threw the keys at him. Clarke switched sides and Bellamy hesitated before he went to the driver side. Clarke watched as he slid into the car with caution, shutting it behind him. He acted like the car was a delicate flower and the slightest touch would make it wilt. When he slid the key into the slot and the engine came to life causing the very seat beneath him to purr he lit up like a child. Clarke smiled to herself and quietly watched as he backed the car up and drove them home. Clarke kept her mouth shut and held in a snicker at his overly caution law abiding driving and the care he took for the car. They pulled up in front of her house and he settled back into the chair.

"You look like you just had your first time." Clarke snorted from the passenger seat.

Scowling at her playfully, Bellamy rolled his eyes. "Some guys only dream of being behind such a car, let alone one so well taken care of." He admitted.

"Well, you're the first other than me or my father." She mumbled to the side window. Both of them stayed quiet at that statement, as if it held some kind of implication.

"Raven told me you covet your car." He broke the silence.

"Well, she's not wrong." Clarke smiled and got out, shitting the door. Bellamy followed and handed her back her keys.

"Thank you." He said sweetly, their hands both on the key. She took the keys and hid a blush.

"Thanks for letting me kidnap you." She smiled.

"Anytime." The near seriousness of his features sent a carnal chill through her body and led her to nibble on her own lip.

Clearing her throat, she looked to the house. "Alright, I should go. Have a good night Bellamy."

"You too, Clarke." He smiled softly at her. She could feel him watching her as she stepped up to her front door and slinked into her home.


	13. Chapter 13

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

* * *

The sun was high and bright as the day had just passed noon. Bellamy was a mess of sweat and a bit frazzled as he drove home, down from the foothills of the mountain. He had to run an early morning conference for some new trainee security crew because his manager didn't bother showing up. Running around like a chicken with it's head cut off for the better part of five hours doing a job he wasn't being paid for not only pissed him off but stressed him out. He wasn't in charge, but today he proved otherwise. While he had a glint of hope within him that his actions today proved he was worthy of promotion, he was more just angry for how irresponsible his boss was and how he had to step up. Dark curls mopped over his forehead and he brushed a broad hand up through them to move them out of the way. They were damp with sweat and in that moment he grimaced at his dash and the lack of working air. Right now all he wanted was go home, get inside, and cool down in more ways than one.

Pulling in to the neighborhood, he passed Clarke's gorgeous blue Firebird and looked at it with a respect. He pulled around to the row of slots at the mailbox and as he fit his vehicle into a parking spot, he realized a few people were out in the grass right outside his door. Putting the car into park, he could see his sister, Lincoln and a few other bodies relaxing on towels and blankets with a cooler out. He didn't really want to join them, he was hot and wanted out of the sun. Sighing, he pulled himself out of his hot car into even hotter air and moved up the sidewalk to the building. The closer he got, he recognized Raven and Madi with a few girls he didn't know, one of which was around Madi's age.

"Bologna!" Raven smirked from her position. She was poised on her back, reclining. Bellamy scanned her figure and couldn't not appreciate the view. Raven was petite but svelte and tan. She clearly cared about her fitness. He didn't want to be rude and he didn't allow his eyes to linger. He met eyes with Madi and gave her a soft smile before he looked to his sister who was on her stomach, her eyes glued to her phone for the longest moment. She finally broke away from it and looked up to Bellamy.

"Hey big brother, we've been waiting for like an hour." She snarled.

"For?" His voice was dry and tired.

"You, dumbass." She replied. Raven and a blond looked over at her. "Sorry." Octavia grumbled.

"I've heard worse." Madi dryly chimed in about the language which caused the women to laugh.

"Uh, why were you waiting for me? I'm beat." He groaned and moved for the door. Octavia leapt up and blocked him from going inside.

"Because, we were going to a water park. We wanted you to go with us, so we waited." She said sternly in his face. Bellamy couldn't help but sigh. He had the nagging feeling he wasn't going to be allowed to just stay home and nap.

Looking dumbfounded and annoyed, he rolled his eyes. "Fine, give me a minute though." Octavia wrapped her arms around him immediately before returning to the grass. Lincoln slid and arm around her as she sat down beside him.

"Don't worry man, I'll do their lifting." He said slyly and giggles followed. Bellamy rolled his eyes and snuck into the house. Once inside, he had half a mind to lock the door and tell them to go without him but he couldn't't let his little sister down. No matter how old she was, she would always be his little sister and his responsibility. He also couldn't help but notice how Madi was excited as his resolve to join them, but he wondered where Clarke was. The moment his feet his the carpet, he flicked his work shoes off and walked into the kitchen. He grabbed an icy bottle of water out of the fridge and a handful of grapes from a bowl. Walking through the living room again pained him, as he wanted to flop into the couch and just hang out. He didn't though. Instead he just walked upstairs while popping the grapes. Sliding into his room he peeled his work uniform off and threw it into a pile by the door. It took two minutes to rummage and find his only pair of swim trunks and he pulled them on. They fit a bit snugger than he remembered. He figured he must have gained weight or muscle. His shorts were a dark navy and fit a little higher than above his knee. The thicker part of his thigh was snug in place. They didn't look overly small, but definitely not the most casual fit. He didn't seem to care enough though because he continued changing into a looser fitting pale grey tank top. He slipped into his favorite pair of summer loafers, as he hated sandals. Dressed, he sauntered back down and out the front door.

To his delight, Clarke had joined the group and was laying on her side next to Raven. He drank in her beauty as she perched on one arm. Her frame was being hugged by a short pair of light wash denim shorts, cut up and perfectly cute. Her bare torso looked longer than it was as he traced his eyes from the button of her shorts to the dip between her breasts. He tried not to stare, but he couldn't help himself. She had on a well-shaped halter style bikini top in a pale blue color. It was plain but suiter her perfectly and reflected her eyes. As his eyes scanned up to her face, he was drawn to look away.

"Bell, did you hear me?" Octavia asked.

He shook his thoughts. "Sorry, I'm tired. Work sucked." He quickly rattled off a lie but it sounded pretty smooth.

"I was saying, we're going to take two cars. Harper's Van and Lincoln's SUV. You want to help Lincoln load up the van?" She asked. He knew it wasn't a question but a suggestion. The girls all stood up and packed the towels they had been laying on. He and Lincoln collected their tote bags and a small cooler. He shrugged and the men took the items to the van he didn't recognize. They slid everything in the back and closed it as the girls walked over.

"By the way, I'm Harper." A gorgeous long-haired blond held her hand out to him. He shook it politely.

"I'm Bellamy. I assume you're friends with Clarke or Raven?" He asked, as she slid open the side door. She nodded.

"Been friends with them for years. Madi and my cousin Charlotte are close, and this…" She reached and took the hand of a dark haired girl. "Is Maya, she's my roommate and best friend." She side-hugged the shorter girl.

"It's nice to meet you ladies." He said kindly and Maya smiled. Harper hadn't stopped smiling. The younger girls appeared and jumped into the Van. Harper went to the driver seat and Maya the passenger.

"We can take the rest of you." Octavia said, knowing Bellamy didn't care to get in the Van with girls he didn't know, let alone young ones. He was relieved, and he shut the sliding door of the Van for them. Octavia and Lincoln climbed into the front of Lincoln's Range Rover. That left Bellamy, Raven and Clarke to sit in the back and he immediately shook his head.

"O, you are not making me middle seat these two. Swap." He grumbled quietly, hoping they hadn't heard his complaint. She laughed and rolled her eyes. She hesitated for a moment but finally climbed into the back and let him have the passenger seat. Clarke and Raven climbed in and they all set off to the water park. The drive was only about a half hour, just on the outskirts of the city where it had more land.

* * *

Once they got to the water park the group met up at the front gate. Octavia paid for her Lincoln and Bellamy much to Bellamy's dismay. He seemed annoyed but he didn't protest. Clarke could see how tired he was. Harper paid for herself, Charlotte and Maya. Raven paid for herself, Clarke and Madi. The group had all been given plastic wristbands and locker keys to wear around the part and they entered, Lincoln and Bellamy in tow with a cooler that was checked at the gate. Madi and Charlotte both got giddy and ran ahead. Clarke was about to call out to her but Raven stopped her and assured her she would be fine.

"Let's locker up then find a place to squat over by the lazy river?" Harper suggested. It seemed she had done this before or even often. After all, this whole outing was her idea. She thought Charlotte and Madi would have fun and all the adults wanted to go with them so it became a day. Everyone agreed and made their way to the central most locker and changing room so that they would have better access to all sides of the park. The girls put some stuff away, including Bellamy and Lincoln's wallets as they didn't care to get lockers.

"I'll be right back." Clarke said before jogging off toward the closest service booth. At the booth she quietly requesting a service and handed over her debit card. She could feel her friends watching her, but she ignored it. Once the transaction was over she was handed a plastic sign. She took it, thanked the worker and went back to her friends.

"Voila. Privacy." She held up a green plastic sign that read 'Reserved Party of' and had her last name written in black market in the blank spot.

"I don't get it?" Maya looked confused, but Harper quickly chimed in.

"She just rented us a cabana." Harper smiled. "Thanks, Clarke." Madi grabbed the sign and looked at the number on the back and the region. They had different lounging beaches where people could relax and each one had cabanas and bungalows for rent. Each cabana was just a small tented room on a low wooden dock with a roped off section of grass just in front of it. They were intended for groups to have privacy and shade rather than to hope for an open umbrella in the grass.

"It says Flo Beach, cabana 12." Madi read off the back of it.

"Oh, that's over by the big wave pool. Not bad. I can lead the way." Harper offered and waved them on. The group headed behind the blonde to their destination, Clarke behind the group. They found their cabana and settled in, everyone dropping their items off and picking chairs. The boys set down the cooler and popped it open.

"So what do you want to do first?" Harper asked the two younger girls, Maya by her side.

"Wave pool!" Madi exclaimed and Charlotte agreed in the same childlike energy.

"Not the big one." Clarke quickly interjected. She had been to this park before and knew the largest of the wave pools could trash you around pretty badly, especially if it was over crowded and you weren't in deep enough. The waves got pretty big and it made mom-mode set in.

"Oh come on…" Madi whined.

"Madi, that pool has pushed me around and I'm bigger than you." She tried to reason.

"You just have to go in deeper." Harper played devil's advocate. Clarke looked sternly at the other blonde and didn't approve of her disregarding her concern, but she also didn't want to be a party pooper. The girls wanted fun, and Clarke was just worrying.

"Fine, let's go." She relented. Madi hugged her… Clarke and the group parted. They stopped by the rental booth to grab their inner tubes for the day first. Everyone went to the wave pool except for Raven. She opted out quietly without saying much and decided to pull a chaise lounge out and sunbathe outside of the cabana.

The pool was massive, a large fan shaped body of water that got deeper as it got more narrow. The waves came in sets with down time between each one for people to recollect themselves and get in or out of the pool. This pool specifically suggested the use of inner tubes, while not required, most everyone in it heeded the suggestion. The group watched, waiting for the wave set to end before they would waded out and get into their tubes. The girls all sat cradled in their respective tubes, and the two boys spread them out before standing upright in their own tubes. Everyone was within arms reach and could link hands if needed while the two men stayed spread between the girls. A horn sounded and the water began to move. The build up with enjoyable, a light flux and flow of the height of water before it hit the real depth of waves.

At the max depth of the wave hit, the girls were laughing and giggling and formed a chain so they wouldn't get seperated. They rode out the waves and everyone was enjoying it. After the first set of waves, the group waded in deeper and this time the pool was a bit more pact. In the same formation as before, the second set of waves started and being deeper in the pool the group really got good air, riding the waves. This time the boys had assumed the same cradled position as the girls had and the chain was broken this time. Madi and Charlotte were holding hands, while Harper and Maya did the same. Whereas the rest of the group just floated near by.

Each set of waves was around five minutes at the peak of movement, not including the slow build up. They decided to go for a third around as it had been very enjoyable thus far. For the third set of waves they stayed where they were despite the two younger girls begging to go deeper. This time a group had of men had made their way into the deepest part of the pool and had separated them a bit as they rudely swam through. No one was worried and the wave set began. Of course, all good things must come to an end because as the height of the waves hit it's max, one of the men in front of the group bailed out of his inner tube and was freediving the waves. His tube came flying at the girls and hit Clarke, sending her toward the shallow end. She held on to her own tube, a robust and heavy inflatable.

An older man grabbed the handle of her tube and stopped her from moving further into the shallows, which is was very thankful. Looking ahead, she could see her friends and daughter all in-tact and looking for her. She smiled, letting them know she was fine. On a down wave, the older gentleman who had stopped her gave offered to give her a push back up to her friends and she agreed. Bellamy also moved down the pool to collect her. Back with her group, they enjoyed the waves. Just before she floated into Bellamy's grasp, she felt a jolt.

"Dude, back off." Bellamy's voice boomed. It was one of the men who had passed them. They had been pushed back and the fellow who had lost his tube was kicking back against the waves while pushing one of his pal's tube. The kick unintentionally landed on Clarke's tube and sent her flying while the highest waves helped. She couldn't get upright in her tube and was sent into the more shallow water where the waves did a number on tube riders. She was quickly thrashed up against the wall of the pool and flipped out of her tube. Startled, she inhaled water and erupted into a coughing fit. A life guard posted at the side of the pool waded over to her and helped her up and out.

"Are you alright?" He asked. Clarke cleared the water from her lungs and held his arm, allowing herself to gain her composure.

"Yeah, thank you." She replied. He scanned her for injuries.

"Are you sure? Do you need a medic?" He followed protocol and she dismissed him.

"I'm fine, thank you. I just have bad luck." She chuckled awkwardly. He escorted her to a chair and fetched her tube for her so she could sit and await her friends. The waves died down and the first person to her side was Bellamy.

"Clarke, are you okay?" He asked, worry in his voice. He knelt down beside her and looked her over as if he were the lifeguard.

She blushed, embarrassed of what just happened despite knowing she shouldn't have been. "Yeah."

Bellamy didn't take her word for any value and he looked over her. "You're bleeding, Clarke." He said. She looked down and turned a bit, her side was scraped. It was nothing gorey nor was the blood a steady stream but pools of blood has surfaced over the open skin and she scooted over, using Bellamy as a shield from the sight of her and Madi coming out of the pool.

"Shit. I don't want Mads to see it. I am fine. Divert? Tell them I had to pee?" She suggested, and looked at him with a pleading look. He hesitated and she didn't know why, but he agreed and ushered her off. Clarke turned away from the pool, keeping her side out of view. A life guard saw her leaving and caught sight of the blood. She tried to avoid him but to no avail. At least out of sight of the group, she allowed him to assist her and get her cleaned up. It was very superficial and just needed to be cleaned and covered.

"You should be set. It's a water tight bandage so you can continue enjoying the park. If you need it re-dressed just find one of the service booths." The lifeguard explained after pressing a clear skin-like bandage over the gauze that covered the wound.

"Thanks. Do you happen to know where I can get a shirt to cover with? Don't need my daughter seeing this and letting a little scrape ruin her fun." Clarke asked sheepishly. He looked at her for a moment then looked around him as they said. He pulled a box down.

"What size would you like?" He asked politely.

"A medium, please." He rummaged the box and pulled out a folded shirt that was tye dyed. He handed it to her. Unfolding it, it was actually pretty cute. The shirt was white but the tye dye was a crumple dye job in purple and blues. The back had the park's logo on the top at the neckline but otherwise it was plain.

"Thank you." She said as she slid it on.

"Do you need anything else?" He kindly asked, and she shook her head. "Well, go have fun then." He smiled. She nodded and left the booth. She found her way back to the wave pool where everyone sat waiting for her.

"Are you okay?" Madi asked, Raven and Harper following.

"Yes, I'm fine!" She softly exclaimed. "I had to pee." She lied.

"And buy a shirt?" Madi sarcastically asked her.

"What, it's cute. They know how to put their merch at every corner." She laughed, making up a believable lie. They bought it and Clarke and Bellamy exchanged a knowing look.

"Who's up for some water slides?" Clarke asked, turning the topic. The younger of the group got excited and so did Octavia. She led the girls to the closes set of slides, the rest of the group in tow. The rest of the day went by without a single hitch and really was a blast. There wasn't a single thing the group hadn't done, including a surfing contest. Bellamy and Lincoln went head to head on the surfing slide and Lincoln kicked the more tired man's ass. It was enjoyable for everyone and as the park wound down for the night, they headed into the city to grab dinner before driving home. Between a fun day at the water park and a full belly of comfort food, Madi and Charlotte had passed out on the ride him. Raven was fighting a doze herself, and Maya was more alive now than ever having really opened up over the day.

The vehicles pulled up to the houses and the adult quiestly unloaded. Lincoln escorted Raven who was in a bit of pain by now to the house. Clarke got herself ready to carry Madi but at twelve, she was almost the same size as her. Bellamy pat her shoulder and quietly moved in front of her. He scooped the girl into his arms and walked her across the lawn, Clarke by his side. They quietly moved through the house and lay the worn out girl in her bed before Clarke showed Bellamy out.

"Yet again, my hero." She rolled her eyes playfully.

"You know, it's not a bad thing to need help sometimes." He said quietly and far too closely. Her silence was probably telling, so much so she averted her gaze and cleared her throat.

"I've got the cooler, see you later Clarke." Lincoln appeared having helped Raven and dismissing Bellamy from helping him. The break in tension was needed and allowed the two to gain space between them.

"I should help him anyways." Bellamy said, despite there being no need. Clarke simply nodded.

"Goodnight, Clarke."

 _Butterflies? What, why?!_ "Night." She meekly said and shut the door. A tinge of pain brought her out of her daze while she leaned against the door and contemplated far too many things. She ended her night by checking on her scrape, showering and climbing into her bed. Of course it wouldn't have been complete had she not looked out her window in passing. Bellamy in his own room and if for a moment, through obscuring curtains, they knew one another was looking back.


	14. Chapter 14

**AN:** I own nothing but my own imagination.

Give me all your feedback, comments, and corrections.

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A long groan escaped Clarke's dry pink lips. "Ughhh" She grumbled and raised her arms up over her head in an insanely needed stretch. Dropping her arms back down, she wiped her hands off on a well soiled hand towel beside her and rolled her shoulders. She stood up and backed away from the easel she had been zoned in on for an unknown amount of time. Her eyes flickered across the work of art she had been so immersed in that she completely forgot the time or that her music had long since shut off.

"Huh…" She looked around for her phone. Rustling through paper towels and sketches she finally found it. Her thumb pressed into the main button and the screen lit up. It was past six in the evening and for a faint moment she felt frantic.

"Oh shit, Madi." She scurried out of her room and into the hallway before it hit her that Madi was at her mom's and Raven was out with Kyle. For a moment she thought she had failed her family but the dedication to her art had just made her completely forget it was a Friday night and that she had the house to herself. In Fact it was planned. The girls had left to let Clarke really produce for her upcoming exhibit and boy did it work. Moving back into her room she sat back on the stool she had been on for hours and surveyed her progress. Before her sat a large charcoal portrait of Madi's face. The detail was down to the beauty marks the girl had speckled on her face. The style was new for Clarke. Instead of her traditional portraits this one was almost emulated watercolor in how some of the harder lines were made to look like they were smeared downward. The swell in the girls eyes was the focal point as the portrait depicted Madi in one of the saddest moments of her life. There was more negative space in the portrait than Clarke had ever done before. The day had been spent practicing this notion as she had a pile of paper on the desk beside her that suggested trials and drafts. Satisfied with the piece, Clarke smiled to herself and pulled a sheet over the easel. In that moment she felt gross and could smell the charcoal like it had infiltrated her lungs. With that she decided she deserved a nice bath.

Clarke moved into the bathroom and drew the curtain back. She pulled the stopper up and turned the tap on as hot as she knew she could handle. While the water flooded the tub Clarke popped back into her room really quickly and grabbed her phone. Back in the bathroom, she shut the door behind herself and turned off the tap. The tub was as full as it could be without her body weight displacing it. She reached into a little white cabinet over the back of the toilet and pulled out a little black paper bag. In it was a bath bomb she had been saving for the longest time. Her fingers released the pink ball into the steamy water and she watched amused as it fizzed and flooded the water with a rosy hue and a delightful fragrance. She was ready to slide into that mixture. She shed herself of her soiled clothes and set her phone on the side of the tub. Her toes dipped into the water and the heat made its way up through her body before she could even step into the water fully. One foot followed the other before the blond lowered herself into the silky pink water. The heat was a bit much and caught her breath but the scent and comfort relaxed her enough to allow her to sink as far under as the tub would allow. She reached out of the water and dried her hand long enough to turn some music on via her phone before just allowing the tub to consumer her.

By the time she was ready to get out of the tub the water had cooled significantly and her body had pruned every so slightly. She rinsed off and finished cleaning off before creeping naked and wet to her bedroom. Once behind her closed door she blindly danced to the music still playing on her phone while she hunted for an outfit. Normally Clarke didn't go out, let alone without Raven. But tonight she felt like going out. Maybe the bath had planted some need on her soul she just had to fulfill. Between playful dancing around the room Clarke managed to pluck together an assortment of pieces that would form a sleek outfit once put on her rose-scented skin. The final look was a deep blue-green tones shorts romper with a bell-cap sleeve and a modest plunge in the front. A gold belt pulled her in at her narrowest and matched the strappy heels she fit her pedicured feet into. Her hair unkempt and wavy somehow suited the look flawlessly. A quick check in the mirror and a touch of coral lipstick, she felt so ready she had to do a double take of how beautiful she looked. With a self knowing grin, Clarke grabbed her wristlet and left seeking who knows what kind of trouble.

* * *

"Shh." Clarke whispered, and opened her bedroom door. Her other hand laced with the thin soft hand of another woman, one with long hair and a svelte figure. The two crept into the dark of the bedroom before shutting the door and flicking the light on. Looking to her companion, Clarke grinned with lust and captured the other woman's lips. The taste was sweet and made Clarke hungry for more as this set of lips was not a new treat for her. Pulling apart long enough to drink in her beauty, Clarke studied Lexa's clothed body and lusted for a fast forward feature. Lexa rolled her eyes at how hungrily Clarke looked, and pulled the blonde into her. The woman leaned into her lover and recaptured her lips, nipping the flesh and biting as she knew it would get a rise out of the blonde. It did. Clarke would moan into the kiss and push her body against the other woman, increasingly needing friction. The girls stumbled in passion toward the bed, to have a night cap of their own kind.

Being a sound sleeper, Bellamy rarely got up in the middle of the night but something lured him out of his slumber tonight. He felt antsy and needed to get up, so he did. First he went to the bathroom to see if a full bladder was keeping him awake, and while he totally did have to pee, that didn't sate his uneasiness. He slinked down to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of cold water out of the fridge, idly stretching his muscles out as he walked back up the stairs. Once back in his room, he quietly shut his door and twisted the flimsy lid off the bottle. The cool water quenched his lips and his body, but nearly came spilling out of his frozen still mouth when his eyes found a view beyond his windows. It was nearing two in the morning, and the world was all but black. Catching a stream of liquid down the side of his mouth, Bellamy rubbed his arm across his face and very quickly reached over flicking the light in the room off, hiding himself from the world.

One could hope it was water he spilled, and not drool because in that moment, Bellamy had caught sight of his blonde neighbor in a heated embrace with another stunning woman, as if on display for him. Sure, her curtains weren't exactly opaque and the gap in the middle gave little to no privacy. Hiding in the dark of his room, Bellamy couldn't help but watch. Somehow while staring like a deer in lights, he managed to cup his water and set it down somewhere. His eyes couldn't remove themselves from the scene before him. Two gorgeous women passionately making out and exploring one anothers petite frames with their hands. Oh how jealous he was in that very moment.

Clarke was kissing the woman like she was hungry and the brunette was holding the secret to nourishment. The girl returned the passion with aggression, being more assertive and pushy of the two. He watched both women peel one anothers tops off, leaving the two clad in bras and hands grazing freshly bare skin. The women buckled in their embrace, presumably tripping on their way to the bed and subsequently laughing as he watched his gorgeous neighbor light up with a wide laugh he could only imagine hearing. He was fixated, so much so he didn't realize how this show was affecting him. Stirring in his shorts was a beast of arousal. As quickly as the show had begun, it had ended when the brunette pushed Clarke seductively down onto the bed and out of his view.

Snapping back to the reality of where he was, and what he was doing, Bellamy felt a pang of shame in his voyeurism. That was overshadowed by his need for release though because his hand had idly found its place under the elastic of his waistband and around the width of his shaft. His eyes searched the display across the lawn for any more life, but all was lost when one long arm appeared to reach for the cord to the very ceiling fan he installed, blacking out the light in the room and leaving him to his imagination. Disappointed in a way, Bellamy turned his attention back on his own situation and climbed into his bed to fervently relieve himself of his new frustration. It took more than one go to satiate him enough to sleep again, and his sleep was full of lustful dreams that would surely force him to wake with another problem.


	15. Chapter 15

"Alright, I sent off my portfolio with a few new pieces in it. I picked out these few, she said she wanted me to pick another three but not charcoal." Clarke sighed, pointing before her. Her desk was a mess, on it were the pieces she decided upon that the gallery owner had agreed to.

"Does Mads know you picked that one." Raven pointed to the portrait of a younger Madi crying. Clarke nodded.

"I asked her permission, she actually insisted." The girls reveled in how bright the kid was.

"What about that painting you did a few years ago, the uh…" Raven looked around not seeing any canvases out. "You didn't pull out your paintings, did you?" Raven rolled her eyes.

"Eh." Clarke reached into the closet and slid out a massive briefcase looking object. Raven moved to help her pull it out and the girls laid it out to open it up. Once open, Raven looked through the few canvases that were in it and found the one she was seeking. It was one of the only canvases on a stretcher.

"This. You'll add this one." She suggested though it sounded more of a demand.

"What, why that one?" Clarke looked confused and wanted to put it back in the box.

Raven sighed. "You remember when you painted this? You were so happy this just came out of you. Most of your portraits are times of high emotion, this was no different but it was on the other side of the spectrum. You were so happy. You need to show both sides of your soul."

Silence veiled the room as they both looked at the array of art. Five charcoal portraits that were detailed to reality and now the canvas which was abstract and colorful. The colors formed the faintest semblance of a woman dancing, her hair blond and the rest of the canvas covered in a rainbow of colors. Raven and Clarke both knew it was her but it was never spoken of. The difference in styles was so very contrasting it almost felt off.

"Okay, what else? She wants eight pieces…" Clarke thinks as she looked through the box.

"How about seven? Use this as your centerpiece and then frame it with your charcoal." Raven suggested.

"She wants to see the different styles I can do." She whined.

"Yeah, well fuck her. Your passion is your charcoal. Put this in the middle." Ray tapped the canvas. "And put three charcoal pieces on either side of it. It would look great. You put a focal point on your diversity but you show off mostly what you love doing and are the best at." Raven arranged the art on the table with what little space there was. Things overlapped.

Clarke studied the arrangement and looked down at it. Silence. She swapped a few of the charcoal pieces around and they needed one more. At her easel she flipped open the large book and flipped a few pages deep. Both women hummed a no and Clarke flipped through more of the pages.

"What…" Raven stopped her when she reached the one of Bellamy. "Holy shit, Clarke."

Her head rolled and her eyes followed. "Shut up, Raven."

"It's good, that's all." Raven put her hands up and said no more.

"It's not done."

"Wow." Raven whispered.

The girls flipped through more of Clarke's art and nothing felt right for the lineup. Clarke pulled out a pleather portfolio storage binder for art. Her fingers rummaged through the collection until she found what she had been seeking. She pulled it out and presented it.

Both women looked at it. "Perfect." Raven said. Clarke nodded and placed it in the lineup. They soaked in the arrangement and both felt content about it. So much so that Clarke found herself smiling and an excitement brewing within her.

"Alright. Show her this lineup and she wont bitch. I'm going to go get dinner started." Raven went to leave the room.

"Actually, get Mads. We're going out." Clarke spun on her heels.

"Alright." Raven took off and told Madi they were going out. A squeal could be heard while Clarke took an overhead shot of the arrangement and fired it off to Lorelei. She was proud of the setup and really felt like it represented her. She just needed Raven to get her out of her headspace long enough to realize that. Being a part of the show was awesome and if it went well it would really advance her career in the art world. At this point she just hoped that Mrs. Wallace would like it and not be offended by the blatant choice to not do as she was told.

After cleaning up a bit and putting things back where they belonged Clarke joined the girls downstairs so they could head out and get food. "What are we in the mood for?" Clarke asked.

"Pizza." Madi quickly declared. Both women knew exactly what she would say, so the question was more for posterity than anything.

"Or Sushi." Clarke suggested.

"Or, Cheesecake Factory?" Raven suggested and instantly won over both girls. A good choice for everyones wants with the added bonus of having the most amazing cheesecake.

"Yes!" Madi exclaimed and Clarke nodded. The girls trailed out of the house and into Clarke's Firebird with Madi sitting in the back.

"Hey look, it's Bellamy." Madi pointed and waved to their neighbor. Clarke looked over at him, he was waving. They caught eyes and both froze a bit, a heat rose within her and made her look away. Raven also waved, but Clarke's hands stay on the wheel and she opted to pull out of the lot and drive away. Neither Raven nor Madi caught any of the tension in her face or the heat that radiated from her skin at the moment.

"Let's eat." Clarke said excitedly to deflect from how she felt despite no one else knowing. The girls enjoyed a big meal that night before coming home and crashing out on the couch to a movie. Raven had woken up and tapped Clarke's shoulder to wake her. She offered to help carry the pre-teen up but Clarke shook her head. She instead tucked the girl in on the sofa and shut the TV off. Raven went up to bed and Clarke followed not long after. Quietly, she slinked into her room didn't bother with the lights. A big yawn escaped her small body and she bumped into one of the tables on her way to her bed. Bleary eyes opened and she saw a light across the lawn. Bellamy stood in the doorway of the smaller room doing pullups on a bar above the jamb. His arms would hoist his tan muscled frame up and reveal he was only wearing a pair of boxers. Ones that Clarke would notice fit a bit snug on his ass which seemed to be just as muscular as the rest of his bod.

"Damn." She caught herself whisper as she watched him pull up against the bar again, his body flexing under the tension. Fully aware that she was staring, she didn't mind because she knew she was in the dark and could not be seen so she enjoyed the view for a few of his reps before flinging her tired body into her bed. A dumb smile on her face slowly faded as did her alertness while she fell asleep.


	16. Chapter 16

A/N: I wrote this chapter a while ago and thought I posted it, but I apparently hadn't. I didn't mean to make you guys wait so much. Beat me up later. Next chapter will be short but key.

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"No, you're not going. You're going to spend the night with Abby and that is that. We're not having this fight right now Madi." Clarke commanded her child and pointed to the stairs. "No get your ass upstairs and pack a bag." Frustration was clearly Clarke's current mode and taking it out on Madi was no excuse but the young girl had been pestering her repeatedly about whether or not she could attend tonight's gallery. Clarke refused to let her because it would be late and she had plans with Lorelai after if all went well.

"Mads get ready, we're leaving in ten." Clarke called up from the bottom of the stairs. She heard nothing in return but assumed the girl was doing as told so she went back into the kitchen and rummaged through her bag. As she dug through the tote she checked off everything in her head making sure she had what she wanted to bring with her. Today would be a long day and she was prepared for just about everything, or so she thought. Suddenly she heard the front door slam shut.

"What the fuck…" Clarke quickly ran out of the kitchen and into the front room to the door. Ripping it open she saw nothing and no one.

"Madi?" She yelled up the stairs and worry set in over her body. In a rush she ran up the stairs and pushed open Madi's door. She wasn't in her room and Clarke was instantly filled with fear and anger.

"Fuck." Her body tore through the house at a speed she didn't remember having. Madi was clearly not inside and stormed out of the house. Without putting on shoes, Clarke ran out the front door and looked around. The main road was to her left and a less than save creek to her right. In front of her was one end of the neighborhood with the most of it behind her. She didn't know exactly where to begin but she hoped Madi had taken off to the playground or a friends house.

"Madi!" She yelled as she jogged over to the mailboxes. From there she went down to the edge of the ditch the creek ran through and looked for any shred of the pre-teen. "MADI!" She yelled louder, in hopes to pull the girl out of hiding. Not only was she mad and worried, but now she was running out of time. This little antic was going to make her miss her own soft debut in the gallery.

"Clarke? What's wrong." Bellamy came jogging out of his house and hollered out to the blond from the sidewalk near the mailboxes. A bit relieved for some backup she ran up to him.

"Madi is mad at me and took off. She's never done this, I'm worried and I'm going to be late and-" Bellamy gestured to his own lip to for Clarke to hush. He mouthed a few words to her.

'She's with O' His lips displayed a relief she desperately needed and her worry faded into anger. Her body prepared to march into his house and confront her but he stopped her gently with a hand on either of her upper arms.

"She came over crying and upset and when we asked what was wrong, O just took over and calmed her down. I tried to explain why you wouldn't want her at the gallery. She wouldn't listen to me but O got her to chill. She's fine and distracted right now." He spoke soft and direct to calm Clarke down.

"I don't not want her there damnit." A very defeated Clarke spoke.

"I know, I know." He rubbed her arms.

"How about she have a sleepover with O tonight and you get to the gallery?" He suggested after a moment of thought. Clarke almost instantly wanted to say no but she knew it was a good idea. Madi adored them and they equally adored her and Clarke came to trust them with her.

"I mean, I guess. I'll let my mom know she's not coming." Flustered, she ran a hand over her face and into her hair messing up the perfectly splayed curls she had put in it an hour ago. Bellamy noted this and hooked a finger into the golden locks and corrected the mess she had just made. That moment in time felt like the world was zoomed in on only them and the brisk air around them got forty degrees warmer. A step back brought them back to reality.

Clearing her throat she spoke. "I should get going. Tell her I love her, okay?" She pleaded. Bellamy gave a silent nod and Clarke padded through the grass back to her house. She felt eyes on her as she walked home. Inside she quickly finished up getting ready, slipped her ankle boots on, grabbed her bag and left.

Downtown, she pulled into the alley behind the gallery and locked up her beloved Firebird. Inside she had to weave through a handful of artists, most of whom were established in the community. She and one other were new to the event tonight and that seemed to be a high honor from this particular gallery. Quietly she slipped into the back office and found Lorelai.

"There you are. Most first timers show up way too early." She chuckled. Clarke almost blushed as she would have had it not been for the little drama she had at home.

"I bet." She didn't know what else to say. She put her back down on a long foldable table that had been set up for the artists.

"So I know we've been over this but I want to make things clear one last time." Lorelai spoke as she rose from her desk. Sidling up to Clarke she handed her a piece of paper.

"If I recall, you said you've never been to a First Friday so I'll explain it again quickly. These three blocks and the buildings that aren't blacked out are participating galleries and shops. Around this fountain we get a lot of street art, sometimes for beggers just ignore them if you explore." She pointed out everything she mentioned as both women held the piece of paper.

"As you know none of us get paid for this and it's a free community event. It's to showcase the community of artists we have here and while we are a gallery the local shops allow patrons and friends to display. The galleries usually get more serious people through so I expect you to be here between two and four and then six and nine. Those are peak hours." Leaving the page in Clarkes hands she watched Lorelai move back around the desk and sit down.

"I have had a handful of Artists who just display their work and leave or have someone stand-in for them. I expect more out of people because this is more than just a free show. That is the main way anyone could fuck this up.

The candid address made Clarke nervous for a moment but she mad the passion to be here. She didn't see it as a handout but an interview in a way. For the serious art world to really get to know her and see her passion.

"It's going to be a long day, so I hope you're ready." She resigned the conversation at that and Clarke nodded as Lorelai went back to whatever she was doing beforehand. Her blue eyes studied the neighborhood as she wandered back to the table and to her bag. She folded the piece of paper and slid it into her bag before pulling out her phone and checking the time. It was only 11AM and the event wasn't listed to begin until noon. It would be ten hours of people freely floating around the participating venues and exploring the world of new artists. She just happened to be one of them.

Stripping off her pleather jacket, she set it down over her bag and got herself ready. An hour was plenty of time to hang and arrange her pieces which had already been brought to the Gallery two days prior as per requested. Lorelai and her assistant went through everyone's submissions before hand to make sure nothing she felt was subpar ended up on her walls. The gallery had been emptied and restaged for tonight. What previously was a large room with a lot of space in it had now been divided by very sleek glossy grey walls with a deep wooden trim that matched all other trim in the building. Each station had lighting installed and signage. Clarke roamed and found her spot on the backside of one of the movable walls facing a corner. It felt weird and segregated which almost left her feeling disappointed. Not letting it get to her she got to work in mounting her pieces in plexiglass displayed that were loaned to her by the gallery. As previously decided, Clarke had six of her charcoal pieces and the one larger canvas to display. Each charcoal got pressed between the sheets of glass and secured with silver knobs which also acted as wall mounts. Without mounting anything she leaned each piece up against the wall and arranged them a few times, stepping back to judge her choice and rearrange a few times.

The wall wasn't very large and mounting the seven pieces would prove a challenge of geometry so she began by mounting the canvas they chose in the middle to work around it. Once she was content with her arrangement she mounted three one the left and three on the right. One on either side would be centered and higher with two other pieces mounted below them all at eye level. The left side consisted of two landscape pieces that were incredibly realistic for the medium used. Above them was a charcoal drawing of a lion that used negative space in place of traditional shading. On the right side of the canvas Clarke had placed Madi's crying portrait on top and below it a detailed drawing she had created when they first moved in to the home. Beside that was the one piece that would probably seem out of place. It was a very detailed realistic drawing of a men's watch laying on what looked to be cracked asphalt as it was the deepest tone in the drawing. Backing up and looking at her job-well-done she was proud and decided to take a picture and send it to Raven before she would go clean her hands and put her jacket back on.

Hours later and Clarke found herself talking with a lot of people who had walked by and asked about this or that. Most questioned felt very critical and almost snobby. It was draining her and she was getting tired when it was only around 4PM. As an older couple dismissed her display, she stood to go and get herself some food only to round out of the corner and bump into someone.

"Oh I'm so-" Laughter stopped her from talking when she realized that familiar scent and looked up to her gorgeous neighbor then down to his side where her precocious pre-teen stood. She couldn't decide if she was shocked or angry but she didn't have a choice when Madi hugged her. Anything she felt was out the window and replaced with pure love as those small arms wrapped around her.

"Oh now you're not mad?" She goaded the kid who replied by rolling her eyes. "Was this your idea, or theirs?" She asked looking into the girls brown eyes and gesturing to the brunette siblings behind her.

"I di-" Madi began but Octavia spoke up.

"I knew it would make her happy so I conned Bellamy into letting us come. I hope you don't mind." The brunette grimaced at the thought of Clarke being mad at her but Clarke smiled.

"It's fine. I hope you didn't come down here just to see me though." She said nervously.

"We did." Bellamy replied quickly but Madi shot him a look.

"He also said we'd get ice cream." Madi ratted the eldest of the group out and he took a step away from Clarke's glare which caused everyone a chuckle.

Octavia pushed past everyone and around the wall. "Alright, let's see th-" She paused. "Holy shit."

"Watch it." Clarke warned her about swearing in front of Madi who again rolled her eyes.

"You didn't tell me you were this good, Jesus Clarke." Octavia's face ready every bit of impressed as her tone did. Bellamy and Madi joined them and the four of them looked to the wall where Clarke had displayed pieces of her soul. Standing there Octavia's hand came to her chest as if she was in physical pain looking over the art. She cleared her throat after a minute too long of silence had passed.

"Incredible." Bellamy summed up what his sister was thinking and what both of them were feeling.

"Told ya'" Madi bragged about her adoptive mother.

"... I respect your opinion but this is my gallery. You are welcome to go elsewhere." Lorelai curtly said to someone as she escorted them through the Gallery and gestured to the front door. The man she was speaking with was clearly offended and scoffed as he walked off and out the door. The older woman turned to the group and walked over.

"I recognize this stunning face." She politely complimented Madi as she came up to them. Madi looked at her awkwardly but Clarke smiled and nudged the girl with silent tap on the arm, out of view.

"Thank you." She said.

"Lorelai, this is Madi and my neighbors Bellamy and Octavia." Clarke moved forward and introduced the three faces to the owner. "This is Lorelai Wallace, owner of this amazing gallery."

"Lovely place." Octavia said and Bellamy shook the woman's hand.

"Are you stepping out now or," She asked looking to Clarke who quickly tried to say no but was interrupted.

"We were going to feed her then give her back." Bellamy suggested abruptly which reflected on everyone's face but his own. Lorelai smiled and nodded.

"Enjoy your dinner then." She turned without pleasantries and took off back to her office.

Clarke gave Bellamy a pointed look. "I didn't realize I agreed to being kidnapped?"

"Well Princess, that is why it's called kidnapping. Let's go." He didn't give her room to argue and moved to usher all three girls out of the gallery.

The four of them wandered found a little bistro two blocks away and Bellamy treated the group to dinner. After that they wandered the other participating venues for about an hour and a half before Clarke decided she needed to get back, not wanting to ruin her technical debut. The group bid her so much love and luck before parting ways and she settled back in at the gallery. A bit of mingling but mostly sitting by herself near her own display. The second window of time Lorelai demanded she be there for definitely turned out to be a rush of people and a barrage of commentary. Clarke was swept up in so much interaction time flew by. By the end of the evening she had amassed so many business cards and new contacts that she was almost bewildered by the networking. On top of that she had to have Lorelai step in and middle-man for her when someone showed interest in buying her portrait of Madi. Everything was marked not-for-sale so when this person persisted and even offered a ridiculous amount of money for it she had to get Lorelai to intervene who lied and expressed she was the owner of the collection and wouldn't part from the pieces. That worked to Clarke's relief. The night felt like a success but Clarke wouldn't know what was going on in Lorelai's mind until the next Tuesday when they would sit down and have a meeting. When the gallery closed up all of the artists had to take everything down and return borrowed supplies right after. It took her more time than expected when one of the frames wouldn't cooperate with her tired hands. Lorelai had taken off at some point which obviously cancelled any plans she had suggested making. Clarke was glad though. She wanted to go home and she couldn't do that soon enough. The drive felt long but it wasn't. Pulling up to the house really let how tired she was set in as she left all of her art in the back seat and opted instead to stumble into the house, grab a cheese stick and then make her way to her room where she would collapse on the bed in a blue sleeveless blouse and black skinny slacks.


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N:** Hey guys! I just wanted to say I fucking love that you guys are still with me on this story, and the feedback I get. Those of you who correct something or just spread love about the chapters, I love it. So thank you. Also, quick personal digression at the bottom of this chapter to explain some stuff if you want to read it.

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Clarke woke the next morning just before noon to Madi jumping into the bed and jolting her awake.

"Get upppp." The younger girl whined and bounced to jostle Clarke around even more. She groaned and turned away from the girl.

"Lazy ass."

"Watch your mouth." Clarke croaked out before thumping a pillow over the girl lightly. Madi fought back by grabbing the pillow and booping Clarke with it. This broke out into a light pillow war which ended when Madi fell off the bed. Laying on her back on the floor, she was hysterical and Clarke jolted out of bed in concern but was relieved to see Madi laughing her ass off.

"Alright." She grumbled and held and hand down to her daughter, which Madi took and together they hoisted her up. Clarke looked for a clock and saw the time. "Ohh."

"Yeah, you're lazy." Madi mocked her.

Rolling her eyes, she flicked Madi's braid. "Have you eaten?"

Madi nodded, "Yeah, like three hours ago." She laughed.

"Let me get ready and we can kill the day doing something fun, deal?"

"Heck yeah." Madi exclaimed before bounding out of the room.

Clarke took her time with showering, getting changed and getting ready. Once all was said and down she trotted down the stairs in olive green capris and a long black tank top. Black canvas flats were on her feet with black ankle socks.

"Alright, what do you want to do?" She asked as she came into the living room to find Madi and Raven both perched about and looking at their phones while chatting idly.

"Let's go to the mall." Madi immediately suggested to which both of the older women cringed. The mall was plenty of entertainment for a pre-teen but to them it was more of a chore and a cesspool of well, pre-teens.

"Or, let's go to a park?" Raven suggested to counter the idea of walking around the mall.

Clarke hummed to herself as she thought through the posed options and if anything else seemed like a better idea. She plucked an apple out of the crisper in the fridge and bit into it looking between her daughter and best friend.

Swallowing down the chunk of fruit, her eyes landed on a large plexiglass box that contained a sorting system for coins that Raven had made them years ago. The very box that helped them save up to buy the house they now lived in. The section that had collected quarters was very full and that gave her an idea.

"Let's go to the Penny Arcade, downtown." Her eyes pulled from the piles of change to gauge the reactions of Madi and Raven. Both lit up to the idea and Clarke knew that was a success.

"Alright, Mads, want to grab a baggie and grab the quarters out of the piggy bank?" She suggested which really was more of a tell than it was an ask. Madi happily complied finding a sandwich bag in the pantry then going to the piggy bank. It was a custom box and each section could be emptied from the top or bottom. It also auto-sorted based on coin size without any mechanics. Madi lifted it up and emptied all of the quarters into the baggie, nearly dropping it in the process. Clarke furrowed her brow. She didn't mean all of them but they could put back what they didn't use.

Once she finished off her apple, Clarke washed her hands.

"Can Octavia and them come?" Madi asked coyly. Raven grinned and Clarke rolled her eyes.

"You spent the day with them yesterday, let's have an 'us' day." Clarke let her down lightly and she actually didn't mind. She could understand Madi liking having them around, but she didn't need them always barging into the Blake's lives.

The girls loaded up into Clarke's car and took off. The drive was a good thirty minutes as they took the longer route through a national park. It was a popular hiking area and very photogenic with monumental rocks and hills. The entire park was still in full bloom, so there was a lot of plant life nestled up under rock formations. Plenty of tourists and families taking photos and groups of hikers around. The drive through the park was a slow one but worth the views. When they finally made it downtown, Clarke hesitated to find a good parking spot. It was a very tight area and she was never one to park her car on the side of a street. Madi and Raven pestered her until she finally relented and found a paid lot to park in.

The girls walked a few blocks passing mostly mom and pop shops that were frequented by tourists. It was a very charming part of town. There were a few cafes and specialty shops with a mix of art sculptures on display between the buildings and on the corner of the blocks. People were packed roaming, even some groups sitting around and strumming on guitars. One could say it was a hippy area. Madi ran ahead when the Penny Arcade came into view and realized she had to wait as Raven had the bag of quarters. As they caught up to her, Raven handed her some quarters and she took off. Clarke and Raven wandered and took the place in, despite this not being their first time.

By the end of the day the girls had depleted about half the bag of quarters and were petered out. Between the three of them they had earned a lot of tickets and racked up a mix of scores on a variety of games. The arcade ran off of quarters and had everything from modern machines to vintage penny-eaters.

"I'm starving." Madi whined dramatically as they got back to the car.

"Hmmm." Clarke started the car and backed out. "Fast food night?" She offered. Rarely did they eat out let alone eat fast good so it was almost like a treat for them to eat junk food.

"Can we do Wendys?" Madi asked quietly as she was very tired. Both women just hummed an agreement, they weren't picky. They drove back uptown and found a Wendy's closest to the house. Madi ate half her fries in car despite knowing not to eat in Clarke's car. They got inside and fell into the sofa with their food. The TV played whatever show was on whatever channel Madi had picked and they enjoyed a meal before Madi fell asleep. Clarke woke her gently and sent her to bed. After cleaning up from their food, Clarke rejoined Raven on the couch but on her way from the kitchen light across the lawn caught her eye. She paused in view of the sliding glass door and looked up, Bellamy stood in his computer room. A sound escaped her which caught Raven's attention.

"Oh. Damn." Raven startled Clarke as she stood next to Clarke, looking up. The women stood there, clear as day, watching a half naked Bellamy Blake doing pull ups in his doorway. Even as a distance, they could clearly see his muscles bulge as he hoisted his body up and lowered it back down.

Clarke cleared her throat and moved to sit back down. She didn't want to give away the fact that she had seen this view before.

"He's so gorgeous." Raven said as she sat back down herself, her eyes on Clarke. She said nothing.

"Don't act like you don't agree." Raven pushed her gently to which Clarke raised a hand in surrender.

"You're not wrong." She agreed and focused on the TV.

"Oh shit." Raven turned her body to Clarke, "You can see into each others rooms." A heat rose in Clarke's body as Raven made the realization.

Feigning surprise, "Oh, yeah I guess you're right. I never pay attention." She lied through her teeth. Raven looked her over for a moment as if she was thinking.

"Maybe you should get non-sheer curtains, or you could set up a camera and share all the recordings with me. I bet he puts on a show." Raven joked and turned back to the TV.

"Better yet, let's just set a camera up in his house and be real creeps." Clarke mocked her joking suggestion and they both laughed.

"We could switch rooms." Raven added to top off the topic with a winner. Clarke rolled her eyes again.

The girls sat and watched about two more hours worth of TV before Raven went to her room. Clarke cleaned up a bit and locked up before going to her own. Once inside, she hesitated to flick the lights on as she gazed through the sheer fabric covering her window. Bellamy was nowhere to be seen but both of his rooms were still illuminated. She brushed it off and flicked the light on. Her eyes scanned over her desks and at the things covering them. She wasn't quite ready for bed but she also wasn't in the mood to work on anything. Her feet carried her around the room and she picked up some paper that had flown about, emptied her trash into a larger bag that sat under one of the art desks, and unloaded her laundry basket into her closet which is where her dresser tucked away. She let her arms fan out about her head and released some tension from her shoulders before peeling off her capris and tank top. Dropping the items into her basket, she turned and froze.

Bellamy took a long hot shower and felt loosened up as well as a bit sore from a good workout. It was one of his favorite routines before bedtime as it really let him relax from the day's bullshit. Running a towel through his curly main, he walked into his room and shut the door behind him. He dropped the towel into a pile on the floor and found a fresh pair of boxers to replace the other towel around his waist. After sliding into them, he turned to get in bed and froze.

Across the lawn, two sets of eyes found one another and both locked up. Neither knew how long the other had been watching but both Clarke and Bellamy stood in their respective rooms in only underwear. Like an awkward dork, Bellamy raised a flick of a wave before quickly turning his gaze down out of respect. He wanted very much to keep looking. Something about her pulled a gaze from as far away as the eyes could see. Clarke returned a stiff wave before reaching behind her and flicking out her lights. She too looked away and finished changing in the dark, slipping into a sleep shirt and sliding into bed. They both found themselves laying in bed, in the dark, thinking about the other that night, finding it hard to fall asleep and riddled with not only embarrassment but lust.

* * *

Okay, so really quickly, thank you so much for reading this chapter and/or this story. I really do love this story. I have to be candid though, because right now I may not be as consistent. I know I used to post once every week or two and now it has become monthly. I am trying to stick to that. However, I have recently started some new therapy and medication routines. If any of you know how that is, it can be hit or miss. It's like trial and error to get things right. That being said, my motivation may be here or there and I would hate for that to reflect in anything I write, ever. I still very much want to hold up to the monthly posts at the very minimum. I am telling you guys this because should I post a chapter that feels wrong, please tell me. You will not hurt my feelings. I want nothing more than to give you guys amazing content. So given the current adventure I am on in my real life in terms of health and mental health, I am asking that you be patient with me and let me know if I mess up. I wholeheartedly love the feedback, good, bad, corrections, what have you. So if I start falling off my own ship, yell at me!

Thank you, and stay beautiful and know, it's okay not to be okay.


	18. Chapter 18

**AN:** Little double post for you as this and the previous chapters both feel shorter in content to me, plus I like to give you guys a little bit to nibble on.

* * *

Clarke tore through the house like a child on Christmas morning.

"I got the spot." She screamed in excitement, her body betraying her and breaking out into some weird cross between dance and jumping.

"Really?!" Madi squaled and lept to hug her. Raven joined and the girls danced in a circle that resembled the most cliche demonstration of excited females known to mankind. They laughed at how ridiculous it was but they were all excited about Clarke's news.

"Just got off the phone with Lorelai. No formal contract unless I want one, to cover my assets, literally. But she said she thinks this will be the best artist relationship she's ever had. She even said, and I quite 'You're going to make a huge impact on the fine art world.'" Clarke got giddy again. She felt like a kid.

"You should do a contract." Raven sobered her up with logic and she knew she was right.

The blond waved her off. "I know, and I will, she has a lawyer I can sit with to draw it up on my terms. She is also setting me up with a different printing company than I use now for higher quality reproductions."

"I have to go to school." Madi whined and moved to the counter to grab her backpack. Clarke jumped in front of her.

"Nope! Not today." She held Madi's hands and plotted how they could spend their day. Madi bubbled over with excitement that Clarke said she didn't have to go to school.

"Let's go shopping." Clarke boldly suggested. Not her favorite thing to do, but she was in a good mood and Madi loved shopping. So did Raven.

"I'll call out too." Raven grinned and the girls planned their day. They decided they would just run around the city and do whatever they felt like. The women took Madi to the mall and went shopping, each buying a few new things. Clarke splurged on a pair of chunky heeled black boots she had been eyeing for months now. They were taller than her go-to style, but so sleek and sexy. She took it upon herself to add the item to her wardrobe with justification that she deserved it. Truly, she did. She did deserve it and damn if they didn't look good on her.

Once the girls had finally returned home, they had blown through a few hundred dollars and half a dozen hours of the day. They were petered out but Clarke was riding high on so much energy. She took this and harnessed it by going to her room and sitting down at her desks. The room was bright, flooded with daylight. Spotify played a steady flow of music while she let the energy come out of her. Today her choice of medium happened to be acrylic on canvas. A classic combination and one that really allowed for versatility.

This new positivity took over her and set her into one of the most productive periods she had in creating since Madi had come into her life. New content and new ideas just spewed out of her. Clarke had been so busy with her art that she had almost let time escape her the longer the week went on. She had found her muse and it just surged through her like a current of energy that needed to arc from the tips of her charcoal stained fingers onto paper or actually, onto wood.

As her world melted into hours of creation, the light in the room slowly dimmed down to the soft artificial glow of light bulbs. The change in atmosphere made her realize it was probably past time for dinner, and a pang of hunger ripped through her drawing even more attention to the time that has passed. Standing up, her back cracked satisfyingly as she stretched and allowed her body to unbend from the position she had been in. Her arms reached for the clouds above and a warm release of tension flowed through her. As she came back to a normal stance, her eyes flickered through the sheer panels of her window. Bellamy was in his smaller room, she could see the back of his head at his computer and she took a good long look knowing he was none the wiser. Her mind wandered in those few moments before a grumble tore through her and reminded her it was time to eat.

"Hey, dinner is up." Octavia popped into the room and yelled to get Bellamy's attention while he wore his headset. He nodded and waved her off. He was reading and listening to music so he tried to finish his place in reading before getting up from his spot. He joined his sister and Lincoln down in the kitchen and the three sat at the dining table as a rare occasion.

"How was work?" Bellamy yawned before digging into his meal.

"Pretty good, solid day. Kept busy. O had a bad day." Lincoln replied on behalf of both of them. He looked to his sister and she rolled her eyes.

"I had a client get sick everywhere. Why people cram food before they workout is beyond me." She cringed at her own food. Bellamy grimaced.

"Yeah that is stupid. At least it's not as bad as some of the literal shit I've dealt with at work." He explained, to lighten her own feelings.

"Yeah, gross. Don't remind me." Octavia gave up her own disgust. The three chuckled.

They ate in silence for a few minutes before Octavia spoke up.

"So, when I came up to get you I noticed, you have a view." She ducked into her food a bit, not so much bashful as trying to feign innocence.

"Yeah, the mountains." Bellamy was slow to retort, almost too slow.

"Or, Clarke's bedroom."

Lincoln snorted with a mouth full of food. Bellamy gave him a death glare and then shared the same gander with Octavia.

"O." He reprimanded her in one syllable and she grinned, knowing she had found him out.

"Really?" Lincoln braved to encroach on the topic which made Bellamy grimace.

"Oh yeah." She looked to her man and nodded, clearing her throat. "He can see into her room clear as day, seems she has sheer curtains." She explained, a laugh coating her tone.

"Oh shit." Lincoln laughed and Bellamy looked uncomfortable, shifting in his seat and trying to occupy himself with food.

"You know what that means?" Octavia's fork stilled, ominously prodding her food as her whatever she was about to say must have needed her full attention.

"I bet she can see into your room, both of them. Oh god. You give her a show, don't you? Working out in the little room all the time." Octavia had a realization and was proud of trolling him all in one fell swoop. Bellamy almost blushed but he tried to be angry instead of embarrassed. His brain on the other hand knew better.

"You mean like you did when you saw Lincoln at your gym and you tried to woo him with your body?" Bellamy was quick to turn the tables and Octavia lit up with a pink shade on her olive cheeks. It made Lincoln smiled endearingly, knowing how true it was.

"Fuck off." She retorted, a childlike pout on her face. Both men smiled at the defeat of the devious young woman and the three enjoyed the rest of their meal, or so it seemed. Bellamy actually sat there wondering how much of his actions were poised, subconsciously knowing she could see his every move. He never closed his curtains just as she had sheer ones herself. The light of day betrayed their privacy but did either of them really care? Did she put on a show for him? Now his mind was reeling, a one track roller-coaster just drifting in every direction. After dinner, he cleaned the kitchen, dismissing the other two. When he retreated back to his computer room he nervously looked out the window and saw Clarke in her spot. She looked focused, leaning forward toward her easel. He couldn't see what she was doing per-say but he could see how enthralled she was and he knew she was none the wiser to being on display. At least not in that very moment. Her world was probably a cloud of colors and mediums right now, unaware of the man looking at her through sheer panels and panes of glass. She looked so beautiful in her element. He smiled, easing his nervous feelings about being called out by Octavia and knew that they both must have enjoyed the unspoken back and forth displays because neither of them countered it.

With an idle grin on his face, he sat back at his desk and found himself something new to read, something enthralling enough to compete with the gorgeous girl entranced by her art across the lawn.


	19. Chapter 19

Fall was a whirlwind. Between having her an unquenchable muse and just being constantly busy, she also had to think a lot about the fact that the end of the year was coming and so was her own private gallery debut. Two things she wasn't ready for. Madi got very sick at the end of October, with the sadness of having to miss Halloween completely which was her favorite holiday. The girls ended up decorating her hospital room and she participated in trick or treating with other kids from the Peds ward in full costume. It made her happy, and that's what mattered. Luckily she recovered from the bad bough or pneumonia and wasn't in there for long. During that time though Clarke was a mess. She spent her time bed-side letting the house go unkempt and her art untouched.

Now she had to face the music. Her debut was planned for the first week of December, right after Thanksgiving. Back to back holidays, things to do for Madi's school, taking care of Madi, the house, and the general change in weather had Clarke at the end of her nerves. She had less than a month to finish preparing for her gallery opening. She needed to select, organize, create and finish as well as do write ups for chosen pieces. She had so much to do and three weeks did not feel like enough time. It really wasn't.

Having gotten things back in order around the house and Madi back at school until Thanksgiving, Clarke had time to work on her art world. With how busy she had been she even let her online shop go by the wayside every so slightly and it made her feel horrible that a few orders went out two days later than they should have. The last thing she wanted to do was scorn her customers like that. In black leggings a longer tunic length olive t-shirt, black boots and her classic black leather jacket she grabbed her wallet and keys. She needed to run to a few stores, mostly craft supply shops and the grocery store. With that in mind she sat behind the wheel of her Firebird and turned the key. Nothing. The sound of nothing drained every positive molecule in her body and made her heart sink deep into her gut and melt into a puddle.

"No." She told the car flat-out. She wasn't having this. She didn't need and couldn't afford this hiccup. She turned the key again, full of hope. Nothing.

"Come on." She slammed the side of her fist on the wheel and tried two more times. Nothing.

"FUCK" She screamed her head off and began crying, the dam of emotional crumbling at the wheel of her car, the car that meant the world to her. She took in a deep sigh and leaned her head against the wheel, crying into it and just letting out everything that had built up. So much bullshit and for all she knew it would just get worse as there for three more holidays coming up. This time of year wasn't easy for anyone.

In full sobbing, she lost awareness of the world around her outside of that car. So when a knock on her window was heard, he made her body jump. She turned her head enough to look over at her window to find Bellamy fucking Blake bent down and peering into the window.

 _Oh great._ She didn't bother composing herself, completely disheveled she opened the door and pulled herself out of the car almost hitting Bellamy with the door.

"Yeah?" She cleared her throat though it held a rasp of tears.

"You alright?" He dared to ask despite how obvious it was that she wasn't.

"Oh yeah, great." Clarke slammed the door shut enough to make them both flinch at the impact. A car like that should not be treated so poorly, and she regretted it instantly.

"I don't mean to call your bluff but I'm pretty sure beating your car up tells me you're not okay."

She sighed and leaned up against the car. "I give up." She stated plainly and he moved a bit to give her space but be right in front of her.

"On?" His brows knit together.

"Life."

"One of those kinds of days huh." He thumbed the inside of his pockets.

"More like a month and I'm sure it will just get worse. Tis the season." Clarke was flustered, clearly.

"Can I help at all?" He questioned.

"Not unless you can fix my car, fix my store, go shopping for me and oh, be me at my debut with an unfinished collection to display." Rattling off what plagued her mind was a relief but she sounded much more hostile than she wanted to or should have. He didn't seem fazed by that though. He mulled over her words and looked behind her. Wordlessly, he reached between them and gently plucked the keys from her hand.

"Scoot." He ushered her to move her ass off the door and let him open it. She did, she moved and stood nearby curiously. Most people wouldn't get the privilege of being in her car let alone behind the wheel or under the hood but he had long since proven his respect for the vehicle and adoration for it. Bellamy slid into the seat gracefully and tried to start it. The sound of nothing again paining her. He fumbled to find the switch to pop her hood but he did so, pulling it and popping the metal up. He slipped out of the car again and moved to the front of it, the massive bush in front of their house poking him in the ass. Clarke almost smiled and she almost had a notion of jealousy for that bush. Once the hood was up and supported, he scanned things over.

"Does Raven know shit about vintage? I know she works on big rigs." He asked, scanning things over.

"Yeah, a bit." She noted.

"You happen to have a battery checker?" He looked up at her full of determination. It made her feel a bit better.

"No, I mean yes. She does but we don't keep it here at home." She replied like that was a dumb question and he broke a smile after.

"She planning on coming home anytime soon?" He asked with a bit of sass.

"No. She's at work." The tension in their replies was becoming catty and petty but she wasn't getting mad.

"Alright." Bellamy moved back to the driver's seat and checked the lights. They responded fine so the battery which could be dead did at least have some charge. He was no mechanic but his persistence in helping meant a lot to her. Sitting on that vintage leather, he pulled his phone out and shot off some texts. They were replied to instantly.

"Raven will bring home her multi-meter on her lunch break." He looked at her and got out of the car. He handed her the keys then moved to the front of the car to close the hood. "It's probably your starter and if it is, she can replace it and I can take you to get the right part. Until then, I have a free day and have no problem spending it with you." The words came out with no effort and he realized how bold he just sounded. Clarke looked taken aback by it.

"I can't ask you to babysit me all day Bellamy. I'll just make do with what I have here." Her hand flailed, pointing to the house.

"It's not babysitting if I volunteered and want to spend time with you, Clarke." Pointedly, he shut down her negativity and she didn't have a retort. "So before you deny me again, what were your plans before this beautiful thing decided to break your heart?" His hand stroked the hood of her car lovingly. Something about his words and actions made her get butterflies.

She swallowed back extra saliva. "I had errands to run. Trying to get supply for my show and groceries." She answered him with little to no emotion, as if he had yelled at her when asking.

"I can stand those, if you'll have me." He jokingly held out an arm. Instead of taking it, she swatted him and took her keys back.

"Fine, but I'll owe you." She gave in.

"Do you write an IOU to everyone you hang out with?" He asked before walking away, ignoring anything she could have replied with. She said nothing though because she knew he was right. It just felt… different. Around ten feet away from her he turned back. "Are you coming?" He feigned annoyed.

Sighing in frustration, Clarke relented and followed him. He seemed determined and maybe what she needed right now was to spend some time with someone else and be grateful for getting some help.

Bellamy climbed into his car and waited for Clarke to follow suit. She did, sliding into the passenger seat of his car. It smells manly.

"Princess, your chariot." He joked and she reached over, decking him in the shoulder.

"Keep calling me that and I may kill you."

"A threat, noted. Where to?" He asked through a shit eating grin.

"Maybe we can just go do groceries." She offered, trying not to keep his time. Yes, he offered to escort her today but her plans were to go to three different supply stores and then the grocery store. Now that she wasn't alone and on her own time she didn't feel like she should do all of that.

"Clarke, if your car was running, where would you be going right now?" His focus on her was serious and it intimidated her.

"Not Your Nanna's Craft Shoppe." She stated quietly.

"The fuck is that." He whispered to himself before finding it on his phone. He plugged the phone into the car so he could hear it through the car speakers and allowed the kind voice to guide him.

"Belt." He pointed before moving the car. She complied, as she did the same thing and then they were off. It took less than ten minutes to get to that shop in particular and he held the door open for her as they arrived and walked in.

"Miss Clarke!" A young girl ran up to Clarke and wrapped her arms around her. Clarke returned the hug and let the little girl run back to the front counter.

"Izzy, I see you're in charge today. Where is Nan?" She asked sweetly.

The maybe six year old looked around the little shop and pointed over to the furthest corner where a woman in her sixties stood.

"Nan!" Clarke called out and the woman alerted, turning to the sound.

"Oh hello sweetie." She spoke so gently and a bit skewed. The hearing aid hooked around her ear explained why.

"How are you?" Clarke made sure the woman was looking as she was a goddess at reading lips.

"I'm fantastic. My little Boss here is such a help." She pointed to Izzy who stood proudly at the counter. "What can I do you for today, the usual?" She asked as she bridged the gap between them. She stood close.

"Bellamy, this is Nan. Nan, this is my neighbor Bellamy." Clarke gave her a look that said something curious and Nan smiled like she knew a secret.

"You're a stunner." She point-blank complimented him and it made Clarke want to laugh. He looked on awkwardly, about to thank her but Clarke saved him from what would be a long-winded flirt from a woman in her sixties.

"Right, so you remember how I told you about that Gallery I was trying to win residency with last time I was here?" Clarke began and the woman nodded. "Well, I debut the first week of December!" The excitement in her voice grew childlike and was precious.

"Oh!" Nan happily whined out and wrapped Clarke into a hug. "I'm so proud of you. Izzy, you hear that? Clarkey got the big show!" Izzy ran over and joined the hug.

"So how can we outfit you for your big show my dear?" The older gal asked, pulling away and rousing up the hair on the kid's head.

"Well I wanted to know if I could get a snoop through your prized collection." The look on Clarke's face read weary, not sure if she'd be privy to that treat again, let alone to purchase anything from said collection. Nan seemed more than willing though.

"Oh of course!" She pulled a retractable key-ring out of her pocket and flipped through a few keys. She unhooked the lot and handed the key to Izzy. "Let Clarkey into the fancy room for me, then bring that key right back." The kid was elated to do as told and guided Clarke by the hand to this illustrious room. While she struggled fitting the key in the lock she eventually got it and opened what once was a small bedroom.

"Tada!" Izzy moved aside and let them in, Clarke eagerly stepping into the room. The room was a bit stuffy, the one window was covered in a panel of curtains that outdated her.

"Thank you Izzy" She bid the girl off to return to her tasks and Clarke ushered Bellamy in behind her.

"Wow." Bellamy was surprised by the sight. The room was covered, literally, in frames. Picture frames of every size, shape, color and age hanging from mounts, the ceiling, shelves and leaning up against the wall. There had to be hundreds of them.

"Yeah, she's a collector and doesn't let many people back here." Clarke instantly began looking through some of the collection, getting a general thumb on what was in there. "Nan owns the shop, that's her actual name by the way. Izzy is her son's daughter."

"How long have you been shopping here?" He looked through the frames himself, too interested in the vast nature of the collection.

"I've been coming here since I was sixteen." She squatted down and looked through a box of stacked framed, pulling out a few.

"Long time."

"Don't call me old. Anyways, my dad would buy me pencils and stickers here when I was younger. When he died, I would come by and buy my own stuff. I like supporting local businesses, so I support Nan. What I can't get here though, I'll go to chain stores for. Also, Nan is partially deaf and the other ear is deteriorating so if you talk to her, make sure she can see those lips." The term came out without thought of it.

"Those lips." Bellamy repeated, smiling at Clarke's word choice. She shot him a glare and ignored him, going back to her task. "So why are we here?"

"I need a few things but I wanted to come through and see if she had anything in here she'd let me buy off of her for the opening. I'm rethinking the display. Lorelai wants me to do so plexi displays like the first friday displays but I didn't like it." She went through some more frames and it seemed nothing felt right to her. "Dammit. I don't know." She sighed and stopped looking.

Bellamy came to her. "You need to chill." He told her. "You want something different, let's start there. Talk to me about what your vision is."

"I'm showing a lot of different stuff, mostly charcoal but also some paintings, and some mixed media. I don't want everything to be stuck in plexi glass, it feels so cold and impersonal. What I create has so much more personality and meaning than that." She poured her heart out in only a few words and he listened, nodding.

"So you thought maybe frames?" He looked around them.

She nodded. "I thought maybe each piece could have it's own unique frame but I doubt Lorelei would let me get away with that and I don't think Nan would let me buy that many pieces.

"Hmm" Bellamy mulled over what she had said and eyed the frames. "How about we grab a few, you see how you feel about them. If you don't like them, you use them on something else. If you love them, we find you more, even if they aren't from this collection. And if that doesn't soothe your soul, we can figure out something else." He shrugged.

Clarke seemed to like the idea, as she looked lighter. "Okay." She went back to pick out a few frames and it took her a while so Bellamy went back out into the main part of the store.

"Hi, Nan?" He sought her out.

Beaming up at him, "Yes handsome?"

"Clarke has tasked me with collecting some stuff for her, she said you'd know what she's looking for?" The older gal smiled at him and wordlessly guided him to the counter. She had already collected and wrapped Clarke's regular order brown butcher paper. It was a charming break from stores handing you everything in plastic and he could only imagine how many artists came through and actually used the packaging in their art.

"She also said she would like five full sheets of white matte board and three of black."

Nan set the parcel down on the counter and turned to a small room behind the desk, in it he could see deep cubicles of matte board and she pulled out what was needed. Izzy stood by to help carry them even though they weren't hard to carry. Nan scanned the items and set them on the counter. "Anything else?"

"No telling, she may be lost in there. You have a beautiful collection of frames." He complimented the woman and she sweetly blushed. Clarke came out of the other room with a bit more pep in her step, one larger frame hanging off her arm and four others in her hands.

"Nan, I'll pay you anything for these five." She presented herself covered in frames. Bellamy took the heaviest looking one off of her arm and held it for her. It was a thick frame and had to be older than everyone in that room combines. It had an age to it and flecks of gold on it's dusty wood.

"Oh good choices. Izzy, what do you think?" Nan included her granddaughter.

"I don't know granny, Clarke is my favorite."

"You heard the boss, we'll cut you a deal." Nan studied all five frames and did some math in her head before snowballing a price to Clarke. "This one is probably worth about two-hundred alone, it's from the 18th century and that is real gold. That plus these four, I'll give you all of them for one eighty." She finally came to a price.

"Really?" Clarke was surprised by the price and Bellamy didn't know if that was good or bad.

"Yes dear. Take them, you'll give them more love than I ever could. We better get an invite to your opening though."

"Yeah!" The kid demanded.

"Deal." Clarke looked so much happier now, elated even. "Handsome here got your matte board, anything else?"

"Oh, my pens." Clarke darted over to a gel pen display like she had the store memorized and plucked out two white pens and two in a grey-blue. "That's all." Nan slipped the four pens into a fold of the parcel she already wrapped for Clarke and rang everything up. Her total was a lot for art supply but shopping at a local place probably meant higher prices. Though the frames are was cost a lot.

"Want me to wrap those? I have moving blankets in the back." Nan offered but Clarke began to say no.

"Where at? I'll wrap them for her. Last thing I want is my car damaging those frames." Bellamy protest Clarke's refutal.

"I'll show you." Izzy pulled Bellamy through the door behind the desk and he came back out with two moving blankets. He laid one out and wrapped the larger frame in it, alone. The second blanket he folded the four smaller frames into like layers.

"I'll bring those back tomorrow Nan." Clarke promised, taking the parcel and matte board into her arms.

"Don't worry about it, they can wait until next supply run."

"You're so good to me." Clarke coo'd.

"You need help son?" Nan offered in vain, knowing Bellamy wouldn't take help carrying the frames from her.

"No thank you." He was polite.

"Izzy, get the door for them, love." Nan pointed.

"Yes Granny!" Izzy bounded to the door and opened it, holding it for them. Clarke went first and Bellamy behind her, wrapped frames in arm.

"Bye Izzy!" Clarke waves off the little girl. The two walked to his car. He had the frames wrapped to where one arm held the stack of four while his other hand balanced the larger frame.

"Which pocket?" Clarke boldly asked.

"Uh, front right." He said in the form of a question, but it wasn't a question. Clarke put her parcel down and without hesitating, plucked the keys from his front pocket. He hardly felt a thing, she was so delicate about it and quick. She unlocked his car and opened the back seat for him. He slid the frames in and then the matte board before shutting the door and opening hers.

"Where to next?" He asked. She gave a courteous nod and took her seat, he shut the door behind her before going and getting behind the wheel.

"Grocery store?" She asked.

"Ah, you said more than one craft place. We're running your errands."

"Bell-"

"Nope. NEXT." He commanded in a very playful tone.

"Hobby Lobby." She stated, and he cringed. One store he didn't like to go into. His mom would take him when he was younger.

"Or Michael's. I need both."

"Then both you shall receive," he paused. "... Princess." He didn't dodge the smack that followed and he set off. They made quick work of the other two stores as Clarke knew exactly what she wanted. Both stores were a quick in and out before they were back in the car and ready to tackle the grocery store.

"I don't need much." She promised, as if she was putting him out. Not only was he learning so much about his beautiful neighbor, but the time spent together between each location was fun. They would chat, she would sing if a song she liked came on and by the Gods if her voice wasn't enchanting. He was really enjoying spending time with her. They pulled into the lot at the store and he followed her into the store. She grabbed a hand basket and they spent all of twenty minutes to fill it up with what she needed. They checked out and he even carried her bags without asking. She grumped about that. Back in the car she settled into the seat with a bit more peace of mind.

"Anything else?" He asked. She shook her head.

"That was it." She meant it, and he knew. He started the car and drove them home. They were only out for just over an hour and a half so Raven hadn't had time to come home and check the battery yet. He pulled up into Raven's parking spot and helped her unload the car.

"Want a beer or something?" She offered awkwardly and he declined.

"Bit early in the day, but thank you."

"Okay, want food?" She offered, her own tummy rumbling.

"You don't have to be a host, I can let you get back to your day." He offered and she clocked him with a deadly glare.

"You did me a favor." She started.

"Or I just wanted to hang out with you." He corrected her.

"Yeah well maybe now I want to keep you around? I'm feeding you. What do you want?" She demanded and he raised his arms in defeat all the while smiling.

"I'll eat anything, literally."

She rolled her eyes and went to the freezer. She had these little mini-quiche bites that she had a hankering for. Turning the oven on quickly, she poured a group of them out into a small pan and tossed them into the oven without waiting for the pre-heat.

"Takes twenty. Don't starve until then." She joked and moved out of her kitchen, a bottle of sparkling water in her hand. She lunged it at him, her own already on the counter.

"I should get shit upstairs before it gets marred by a chaotic twelve year old when she gets home." The reality of her statement was understandable, Bellamy had his own tornado for a long time; Octavia.

"May I help you or are you going to sass me?" His words got him a glare yet again, and she nudged her head toward the stairs.

"Alright, Fabio. I'll make you do all the work." She crossed her arms but he had the sudden urge to tickle her and really check her resolve. He just didn't know if she'd murder him or what would transpire.

Silently, he went to where he put the frames and picked them all up. He looked to her, waiting to be guided. He wasn't going to walk through her house without her leading him. She took that cue and grabbed the rest of the art supply, her own arms loaded with bags and the matte boards. She led him up the stairs. The view he had while climbing up the stairwell was fantastic and he had to wash his thoughts to the back of his mind. It was a hard task.

Once inside her bedroom, she moved to put things down. It was an absolute mess and she realized that when she turned to him with a look of embarrassment.

"I should have warned you, it's a fucking sty in here." Her cheeks were red.

"I've seen worse." He lied. He hasn't seen a bigger mess but to be fair, her room was also her office for work, where she created all of her art. He also knew Madi had been very sick recently. "Where do you want these?" He asked, looking around. The room wasn't big enough for how much shit she had in it but that was due to the sheer volume of art she produced and stored.

"Uh…" She looked around the room and pointed to the wall next to him. "I guess there." She shrugged. He put them down where asked and as he stood back upright his eyes fell to her window, more so the view she had beyond it. He knew she could see him, they had locked eyes before, which was something he had thought about often. The things he had seen. He shook his head and focused back on her, she wasn't paying any mind to him. She was moving aside some things on her table and quickly flipped her sketchbook.

"Ashamed of your art?" He asked, genuinely curious as to why she'd hide it from him. Maybe it was one of those things where she didn't want anyone to see it until it was done, but he felt the need to poke at her.

"No. Actually, I wanted to ask-"

"Clarke!" Raven yelled from the bottom of the stairs.

"Oh." She moved out into the hallway. "Coming." Bellamy looked at the desk then back to her and then followed her out of her room, shutting her door behind him. They jogged down the steps and to Raven's surprise, appeared together.

"Oh shit, did I interrupt something?" Raven had the most mischievous grin on her face.

"Oh shut up." Clarke rolled her eyes.

"Middle of the day and I find a boy coming out of your room, whatever will I do with you?" Ray mocked her.

"Nothing, just like nothing was happening. He carried some stuff up for me."

Bellamy stood there awkwardly while they bickered about how they did nothing at all.

"Right, here's the meter. I have to get back two work. You two go back to doing whatever you 'weren't.' doing?" She threw air quotes and Clarke sighed, exasperated. Raven was gone as fast as she showed up.

"Here." Clarke handed him the multimeter, annoyed.

"Getting caught with me that bad huh?" He trolled her as he stepped out of the house and he caught the slightest glimpse of red in her face before he moved to the car. She threw the keys at him.

"Oven." Her excuse was shoddy, but she disappeared into the house. While Bellamy tested her battery, she stood in the kitchen thinking about his comment. Her face was warm and it wasn't because the oven behind her was on. Her hunger was strong right now, for more than just food. She checked the oven, it hadn't been twenty minutes but she was impatient and this was better than avoiding Bellamy.

Minutes passed and Bellamy rounded the corner into the kitchen where Clarke still stood, her focus on her phone. The way her hair fell was so cute.

He cleared his throat and she jumped.

"Fuck." She exclaimed quietly and he smiled.

"Raven would catch us." Now that broke her, the red in her face as bright as day. It made him grin from ear to ear. He didn't give her any time to throw a fit though she did seem speechless. "Speaking of which, I texted her." She looked confused, Bellamy figured that is who she was texting. "Your battery is fine. Raven thinks it's the starter and wants me to take you to buy one so she can replace it when she gets home. She demanded more than suggested. I quote 'We have to fix her car, so take her or I'll kill you.'" He shrugged.

"Okay." Was all she said.

"Okay, we'll get you the part after you eat, or okay get out of my house and stop harassing me?" He asked.

She hid her blush by turning back to the oven.

"If you're willing, we'll go get the part."

He smiled at the notion of spending more time with her. "Mind if I wash my hands?" He asked, stepping into the kitchen. She shook her head and he moved to her sink. The sink had no space between it and the oven, which is where she hovered. He had to move around her awkwardly for a moment before she finally moved so he could access the sink. He washed his hands thoroughly and when done, she handed him a towel. He thanked her and moved out of the kitchen to sit on the bar side of the counter.

"You alright?" He asked, though he tried his hardest not to smile. He knew Raven had gotten a rise out of her and he didn't help.

"I'm fine." She smiled fakely.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'd totally let my roommates catch you in my room." He couldn't resist and the grin on his face warranted what happened next. She took the towel he just used and threw it as his face.

"You're a troll." She stated before going to the oven. She pulled out the tray and dumped the little quiche onto two plates. She slid one to him, a long look caught her off guard. He was staring and smiling. Hell, even his freckles were smiling.

She took her food and sat on the couch, kicking her feet up on the coffee table. The TV was on. It was almost always on. He watched her pop a hot quiche bite into her mouth and try to ignore him. He decided to give her a break and let her be, staying where he was and eating his own share of the little snack. They were actually pretty tasty. He moved to put his plate by the sink before leaning in the threshold of the kitchen. Clarke was on her phone again.

"You ready to run and grab that part, then I can get out of your hair?" He spoke up for the first time in what felt like ten minutes. She pressed her screen dark.

"Oh, yeah. Sure." She stammered, standing up to put her own dish away.

"Turn your oven off." He reminded her, as she had actually failed to do so. She noticed he was right and felt like a fool.

"Thanks."

"Yep."

The two left the house again and Bellamy took her to an auto parts shop he knew was fair and likely had what they needed with no fuss. He took control of the conversation and got them to find the part for her, even offering to pay for it but the moment he tried to she slid her card into play and clocked him with a glare that could ruin his world. He backed off.

The drive home was quiet, a weird tension in the car. She seemed out of energy or consumed by thoughts and he didn't want to upset her by picking on her. He pulled up into Raven's spot again, but didn't get out. They sat there in the car awkwardly for a moment, like teenagers ending their first date. Clarke was the one to break the silence.

"I uh." She stopped, cursing herself.

"Hypothetically, if I-" She stopped again. "Fuck." Unable to find her words, she got flustered.

"Can you come in again?" She looked at him with pleading eyes, and he nodded. He didn't know what she was thinking or what the problem was but he would play along, not knowing what he was getting into. They got out of his car and went back into her house. Once inside, she kicked off her boots.

"Come." She hushedly spoke, and ushered him upstairs. He didn't know what to think, but he followed her. Once in her room, she moved to the little spot behind her tables where she spent most of her time. Her fingers tapped the large pad of paper on her desk and she hesitated.

"Clarke?" He asked, confused as to why she was being so weird and why he was in her bedroom again. She looked at him and looked so scared and uneasy.

"This, I." She sighed. "Ugh! This is going to be weird. Or seem weird. Whatever. I need your consent." With that, she lifted the cover and a few sheets of thick paper, revealing a large charcoal drawing of him. He was floored and his face read it. Unfortunately, to her it read like horror rather than admiration.

 _To be continued…_


	20. Chapter 20

_**A/N:** A short but progressive chapter. I'm not quite myself lately, but this and my other story really are works of passion for me, so please continue giving me your feedback, critiques, comments and the like._

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 _... Continued._

"Wow." His one word made her so scared she physically looked nervous. He moved closer to her, closer to this artistic rendition of himself. It was uncanny, looking at himself but on paper and in black and white. The amount of detail was something he couldn't grasp, so much so he shook his head in disbelief, completely involuntarily.

"Okay, I'm sorry." She said. He looked up, confused.

"Oh, no. I wasn't telling you no, Clarke." He moved into her air space. "I just can't grasp how amazing that is. You are so talented."

"Oh."

"I don't even know what to say." He felt emotional being the subject of her art and the product being so stunning.

"Well if you say no, I'll understand."

"To what?" He was confused.

"I want this to be one of three main pieces for my debut." Her tone was so meek, half the woman she normally was. Something about this request made her so uneasy and nervous.

"Are you serious?" Again, he was floored.

"I know I'm weird. I promise, I'm not a creep. I mean, you know you're gorgeous and one day I just wanted to draw and when I looked up, I realized I was drawing you. I guess you're a muse for me?" She rambled on and he zoned out, studying the mirror image of himself on paper.

"It's not even finished, I know it's rough." He snapped back to reality and looked at her. Her face lacked any color other than a milky pink right now. Her nerves were taking over and she looked so innocent and sweet.

He shook his head, as if to brush away thoughts before looking back to her. She couldn't tell what he was thinking and it made her stomach flip.

"That isn't complete?" He asked, quickly distracted by that latent thought. She shook her head. "Wow, Clarke. Yes, please. It's an amazing piece and honestly I'm beside myself." She looked relieved but watched him. He quickly looked out the window and then scrambled himself.

"Oh, I forgot O needed me to be home." He said suddenly. "You good on errands?" He asked, turning his back to her, for reasons. She stammered but replied with a quick yeah.

"Alright, I'm going to jet. Thanks for today, and honestly, that is amazing." He repeated, allowing himself to only turn to the side to look at her. He was obviously awkward and Clarke noticed it. Sadly, she took it for something it wasn't. Bellamy then left with not much else being said. She locked the door behind him as she had followed him down the stairs. Her back to the door, she sank down to the floor confused and sad, thinking she had freaked him out. She even thought she had to pull the piece from the show, but that didn't upset her as much as the thought of upsetting or scaring Bellamy into thinking she was a creep. In that moment, on the floor, she realize how creepy she really was. He had caught her eyes across the lawn one night, and now she had shown him that not only did she draw him but what he may not realize is that he was the subject of what would likely be the masterpiece of her art career.

Behind the sanctuary of his own front door, Bellamy felt like he could finally breathe. Though, he didn't know quiet when he had stopped breathing. His neighbor, the sultry and unique woman she was, just revealed to him one of the most stunning charcoal portraits he had ever seen but the subject of it was him. Him, with a boyish and innocent grin. Something only Octavia ever noticed about him, and subsequently gave him shit for in a loving way. He ran a hand over his face and it idly found something to adjust below his waist. He was hot, scorching in fact.

When he stood there and looked at himself rendered on paper and then the innocence and anxiety tearing through her, he couldn't help but have every fiber of his being ignited with desire to kiss her. To shut her up and settle her nerves. To thank her for how beautifully she portrayed him. Sure, it was a little weird for a nano-second, as anyone would think when they see someone made art with their likeness. However, the sheer quality of work and detail he saw without really studying it was remarkable. She was remarkable. Something about seeing her piece and her vulnerability, on top of the fleeting moments through their windows must have just added up to something that ticked on a lust that reared up. He had to get out of there.

Interaction had ceased to exist between them after that. Spare for a moment when Raven called him for a quick hand with the repair she had to do on Clarke's car. He felt nervousness in that moment, like he wouldn't know how to interact with her. It was weird for him which made him feel like actually hiding. Bellamy Blake, nervous about a girl? What the fuck? Luckily for him, Clarke wasn't there. He helped Raven and they chatted about the holidays

Over the next week or so, Bellamy avoided thinking about her. Not because he didn't want to, but because the effect she had on him. Before, when his imagination would run wild if he caught a glimpse of her up to no good, he'd run with it. He'd sleep sweet that night after being fully sated by himself. Now something felt different. He felt perverse and almost guilty.. Maybe it had to do with now knowing that he was on her mind, if only in an artistic capacity. Maybe it was the sweet notion that she would draw him. No one knew, not even him and with this new train of thought he was left very sexually frustrated.

On the flip side, Clarke was very busy and very stressed. She soon forgot about how awkwardly Bellamy had left that day and how vulnerable she felt about the whole thing. Her scramble to get things done on time, be happy with her work and maintain her online store felt like she was being spread thinner than tissue paper. Raven took mom-mode for Madi most of the month and let Clarke focus on what she needed to. Of course they both mandated that Clarke take a few days off and relax which didn't really work. She obliged shortly but would mull over what she needed to do even in her downtime. Her brain constantly processed finishing touches to specific pieces and just how she wanted things to be arranged.

In the week before her even, Clarke was preparing everything. She would set up on Monday as early as she wanted and be ready for the doors to open come seven PM. Most of her pieces had been finished off and moved to the storage of the Gallery. What work was still at home had just not been finished or she was just mulling over it more and more. In particular, she had left her portrait of Bellamy untouched, still attached the spine of the sketchpad. It was finished but she hadn't signed, sealed the charcoal or mounted it. It sat there, untouched. Even when she had to do some smaller items for her store, she just moved it to the side to work on whatever she needed to work on. There was something so different about this one piece that she hesitated to finalize its completion.

Saturday and Sunday were spent out of the house and away from the gallery. Madi and Raven did what they could to keep her busy so she didn't over-analyze anything and better, relaxed. Raven insisted they go to a spa. As much as Clarke put up a fuss, she melted into a puddle under the beautiful pressure of the hands that worked her body. Every knot in her muscles faded and while she was a tad sore after the fact, she felt so light and free from the stress that had been weighing her down. After that, they decided to go to the Salon. All three of them got their hair done. Raven just had a trim, blow-out and lovely curls put into the ends of her long brown hair. Madi convinced Clarke to let her get streaks which really didn't show up well, but she was happy. Lastly, Clarke emerged from her salon chair with a surprising turn of style. Her hair was cut short, leaving a small gap of air above her shoulders. The natural curl was tamed into and smoothed out, something she rarely ever did.

"Well?" She presented the sleek and flirty blond bob to Raven and Madi. They both praised her for the choice before Madi suggested their next stop.

"You should buy something fancy for your exhibit."

"I agree." Raven put a hand on Madi's shoulder, literally backing her statement.

With a heavy sigh, she cocked her head. "I think we've spent enough money today."

"But this is big, it's your first time getting your own show at a gallery. You should celebrate it." Madi explained. Her thought was innocent and very sweet. The look on her face even more charming.

"Fine, we can go shopping but nothing fancy. Just something… nice." Clarke shrugged.

"Deal!" Madi exclaimed and the three took off to find her an outfit. It would turn out to be an adventure and frankly the perfect way to spend their time. She got to spend time with her two favorite humans, take some time for herself and find something that would really send the right message about how much her art career meant to her. Of course, no shopping trip went without all three of them coming home with something. Hell, they almost always brought something home for the house too, as if they needed more tchotchkes and decor. Nonetheless, it was fun and a well needed adventure.


	21. Chapter 21

**A/N:** Hey, I know this is later than my normal monthly and I apologize. I haven't been alright this last month and I didn't want to give you guys something I didn't feel good about. I had this chapter planned out but I just couldn't find my voice as I wrote and on top of that I've been sick for about six weeks now. I finally found my tone though and I am happy with this chapter, so I present you a juicy one. It's funny actually. This story was supposed to be a lot more smut and a lot less fluff than Bedside Manner but I scuffed that, didn't I. Enjoy! Be safe.

* * *

The day had finally come; It was her debut exhibit at the gallery. Admittedly, she hadn't slept much because her mind wouldn't stop thinking. Always one to worry, she had to play out every scenario that would likely never happen. When her alarm went off it jolted her out of what little deep sleep she did manage. The digital clock on her bedside table only read six-something in the morning and she leered at the idea of how long the day ahead of her may be. She tapped her phone into silence and rolled over, trying to bid herself to sleep longer. It didn't work. Maybe twenty minutes passed by and she relented, peeling herself off of the bed.

Trudging out of her room and down to the kitchen, Clarke got the coffee maker going while rummaging for something to eat. Looking through the pantry, arms suddenly appeared around her waist.

"Morning." The soft voice of a sleepy Madi followed a warm and light hug. She turned into it.

"Morning. What do you wanna eat?" She asked as she looked back to the pantry. Madi peered into it and didn't look for anything in particular. She knew what she wanted without a beat.

"Pancakessss" She drew the word out in a pleading whine and Clarke rolled her eyes.

"Fineeeee." She mocked her child. "I'll cook, you get ready for school."

"You're making me go to school today?" She pouted.

Clarke rolled her eyes. "Yes, nerd. You can come to the opening, but you have to go to school. We made this deal like a month ago. Don't give me grief about it now." She dictated while pulling together ingredients. Madi remarked something sarcastic on her way out of the kitchen and back upstairs. Breakfast was prepared and coffee was made, the smell drawing a groggy Raven down to the kitchen. The trio enjoyed fluffy buttermilk pancakes and the older two having hot coffee to awaken their bones. Raven and Madi took off and went about their days like normal which left Clarke in the house alone. This was their routine but today felt different. There was a density to the day, as there should be. The gallery was one of the best in the city and her work was going to be on exhibit. The thought alone made butterflies whirl in her gut as she tried to go about her day normally. Chores kept her busy most of the morning and just after one in the afternoon she got herself showered and ready to leave. Casually dressed, she had her outfit for tonight set aside in a garment bag and essentials packed in a tote to take with her. Ready, she headed to the gallery to set up and perfect every last detail much earlier than she needed to.

At the gallery, Clarke and a few of Lorelai's team spent a few hours transforming the show floor into her exhibit. Faux walls were rolled out that had already been painted and prepared for her, they just needed to display everything. As they had previously collected a bunch of frames from her favorite supply shop, Clarke had come up with a less than standard aesthetic for her exhibit. Breaking away from the tradition of stark white walls with the art framed or often mounted on black matte board, Clarke broke the code. The walls were a dark grey-blue but it didn't make the room look closed off or dark. It looked clean and crisp. Especially because each of her pieces was adorned with a stark white frame. They all varied in style but were painted a flat white to adorn each piece. It made everything look cohesive and didn't take away from the subject of any of her pieces. In all, she had around thirty pieces hanging on the walls when they were done, including the seven she had shown previously. A faux wall sat in the middle of the room. On either end of it were connecting walls fanned out slightly to draw you in. These three walls held the three pieces that meant the most to her. In the middle was the large abstract dancing girl painting she displayed previously. The wall to the left shone the portrait of a crying younger Madi which left the right wall to showcase Bellamy's portrait. She stood there looking at the pieces lined up perfectly on the wall and debated moving the one of him. Did it belong there? The painting was essentially a self-portrait in an abstract way, but only she knew that. The portrayal of her crying daughter before she became her daughter was a poignant piece and the two worked well together, but the one of Bellamy felt off. It was her masterpiece. That was clear, but he's just the neighbor. Should she put something more personal there in its place?

Before she could let her mind nag over and over about it Lorelai pulled her from her thoughts.

"Perfect." Her heels clicked as she moved next to Clarke who reacted with a bit of surprise. Really? This arrangement was perfect? Pink rose on the apple of her cheeks but she didn't know why.

"Go grab dinner." Lorelai checked her watch, a dainty gold band with an analog clock face. "We open the doors in less than an hour. Get a meal in you and get ready. I'll have the guys clean up and finish labeling things."

"Alright, thanks." Clarke smiled and Lorelai returned it. She took to the stairs to collect her purse from the basement where she had her belongings in a small room. "Oh make sure they-"

Loralie dismissed her thought by raising a hand and smiling, "I know. Not for sale."

"Thank you, Lorelai." A heartfelt appreciation was left as she bounced down the stairwell and unlocked the basement door. She grabbed her wallet, went back upstairs and out the back before wandering off down the street to find food.

After grabbing a quick pita Clarke snuck back into the gallery and slipped into the basement where she got ready. In that little room which was bare except for a small side table and armchair, she had her bag, garment bag, and portfolios for all her art. Clarke stripped down to her bra and panties. In the moments it took her to get into the garment bag she felt odd being in such a state of undress in the basement of an art gallery. Quickly, she found the skirt hanging in the bag. A white skater style skirt, clean, chic and simple. She stepped into it and zipped up the back. Next, she slid on a simple, sleek black sleeveless top. In the tote were one of her favorite pairs of heeled booties, a simple black peep-toe style she could slip-on. Out in the main room, she looks in the large mirror nearby to check her hair and reapply a nude lip. Ready to go, she tucked things back away in the room, locked up the basement door and headed back upstairs slipping the key and her phone into the pockets hidden in the skirt. It was time to face her debut.

As the hour rolled around, they let people in. It wasn't a slow trickle, it was a quick-fill. The room had people all over it and the building wasn't that big. Lorelai stayed with Clarke and showed her off to people she knew, be they art dealers, industry people, or collectors. It took up a lot of the evening between meeting new people, fielding questions, and offers. The offers were overwhelming. Almost everyone she spoke to over the first two hours of the event were friendly and charming. Most of them wanted to know about her, her process and her inspiration. A lot of attention was spent on the portraits of Madi and Bellamy and a few people asked who they were. She explained and left it at that, but some people pushed. Some people prodded and nearly demanded she sell those two pieces. One woman hounded her about Bellamy's portrait but Lorelai handled it. At one point, just wandering by herself and meeting people Clarke overheard a guest gushing over the man in the portrait and how delicious he was. Something about the way she said it felt like a violation. That was hers. The art piece, of course.

Free of the barrage for a bit she got to hunt down her family. She found Abby, Raven, Madi and Marcus looking at the main trio on display.

"Hey." She smiled and interrupted something Abby was saying.

"Honey, congratulations." Abby hugged her daughter proudly and Marcus followed.

"It's amazing to see all of these pieces together." He gestured around the room. "I always knew you were talented but you've never let us see it like this and now look, your own exhibit. You must be proud."

Nodding, "I am. It's overwhelming but it feels good and it feels right." Beaming, she pulled her kid in for a hug. "And this one is a hit. So many questions about her portrait." And offers, but she wouldn't say that.

"I bet they are more curious about that one." Smugly, the pre-teen pointed to the charcoal rendering of their abnormally gorgeous neighbor and Clarke blushed, gently squeezing Madi's shoulder.

"You're not wrong." She laughed and they all chuckled.

"Speaking of." Raven cleared her throat with a grin and nodded toward the door. It would appear that the subject of discussion had just entered the building and his sister and Lincoln were by his side. It occurs to her in that moment that they didn't know Bellamy was a subject of one of her pieces, or so she assumed. She was proven right when Octavia barreled over to them in a less than classy fashion and her jaw rolled to the floor.

"No fu-" She paused and clocked Abby and Madi, rethinking her language use. "When? What?" She pointed to her brother, the 2D version of him.

"Chill O." Bellamy's voice was soothing and calm. Lincoln moved to her side.

"Wow." His one-word felt powerful and Clarke blushed again. She felt like it was her on display, not her artwork. In reality, it was her on display though. Each piece was part of her in a way, an expression of herself. Even the random one somewhere by the door that was just a skyscape of space in a watercolor.

"Uh." Clarke didn't get a chance to explain anything when Lorelai called for her a few lumps of people over. She beckoned her. "Boss is calling me, I'll be back." Fervently, she left feeling bad for not having an excuse for why she drew him. When she really thought about it though, there wasn't one. Look at him. That was muse enough and when he is around his sister and he's happy and calm he seems his best. That boyish smile she captured was because of Octavia. She probably could have said that. Now she knew what to say when she had a chance to chat with them again. Others had plans though.

"Mr. and Mrs. Norris, this is Clarke Griffin, the artist to this beautiful collection." Lorelai introduced her to another person, another handshake, and more questions.

Politely, she greeted them and they bid her congratulations on the exhibit. She learned of how they knew Lorelai and they showed an interest in a few of her pieces. As they walked the room together, they rounded back to the trinity on display and stopped. The wife spoke up first.

"These two pieces." She paused, as if speechless, shaking her head. "I don't have words."

"Thank you Ma'am." Clarke smiled.

"It's a shame you're not selling, the duo would be the perfect pair. Is there any chance you'd reconsider?" Clarke rolled her eyes, if only in her mind. Lorelai went to speak but Clarke beat her to it.

"I appreciate the compliment, but I couldn't do that. This here," she gestured to the portrait of Madi, "is my daughter. I'm sure you can understand why I couldn't sell that."

The woman nodded. "I completely understand, and I assume this one is your husband?"

A red peppered her face instantly and she shook her head, trying not to choke as she spoke. "Oh, no. That's my neighbor."

"Oh." The woman looked at her as if she had so many more questions that would clearly not be appropriate to ask.

"And that piece, of course, is also not for sale." Lorelai stole the attention from Clarke's red cheeks and the woman's imposing glance. Her husband even looked confused and they snapped out of it at Lorelai's voice rejoining the topic. She mitigated what could have been a very awkward situation.

"However, everything else on display is up for discussion. Mingle, enjoy the exhibition and let me know." She ushered them off and away from Clarke before leaning in. "How about you take a break from the crowd for a few."

Clarke silently nodded and took the offer eagerly as she made haste for the stairwell, disappearing into it.

After explaining to Octavia that he didn't know about the piece until recently, which appeased her prying any further, Bellamy was with his family and Clarke's just wandering the show and keeping to themselves. He clocked Clarke looking very uncomfortable in her conversation from across the room. Seeing her nearly run away from the gathering he worried, as was his second nature.

"Hold my drink, I'll be right back." He leaned into Lincoln and handed him his open beer. The other man nodded and took the drink, dismissing him from the group. Bellamy weaved through an even larger mass of people than there was twenty minutes ago to find Lorelai.

"Excuse me." He politely got her attention.

"Yes?" She turned to him. "Oh, Bellamy, isn't it?"

He looked bewildered but realized why she'd know him; the drawing. "Yes. Do you know if Clarke is alright?" He asked.

Lorelai sort of shrugged. "Debut can be tough and some people don't like being told no. I told her to take a break, she probably went downstairs."

"Oh." He acknowledged. "Do you mind if I go check on her?"

A flourish of her hand and a shake of her head later, "Of course, but you'll need the key. Here." She reached into the pocket of her tailors cream suit and pulled out her keyring. She pulled the one key off of it and handed it to him. "Bottom of that stairwell." She pointed to the back of the room where a dimly lit stairwell was seen. He saw it, he saw where she went.

"Thanks. I'll return this to you." He bid her a nod and went for the stairs.

He walked down the stairs and could hear her heels clicking against the polished concrete floor. Following that sound, he found her pacing. She looked nervous but glowing. The lighting was bright and clean for being in a basement and it made her look almost ethereal.

"Clarke." He softly let her know he was there and she looked up, but she didn't stop pacing. "Are you alright?" He asked.

"Yeah." She said in a tone that made him think she was lying. He moved in toward her but kept his space, his fingers idly messing with this keyring in his hand.

"There are so many people upstairs." She said with a sigh as she finally stopped and turned to him. She seemed frantic or just stressed out. "I needed a break." A feigned smile spread across her lips. He didn't fall for it.

"Yeah, you pulled in a crowd." He grinned, proudly.

She nodded and hummed an agreement. "And an onslaught of questions."

"How do you mean?" He leaned against the wall.

"Like, I knew to prepare for if someone wanted to buy something. We didn't preorder prints because we wanted to gauge the desire but I keep getting hounded for pieces I don't want to sell or nagged about selling the original. Lorelai warned me but I couldn't have fucking prepared for that." Her hair flailed up to the ceiling, gesturing to the people above her. She almost seemed angry.

"You don't have to sell what you don't want to."

"I know, I just feel targeted. They try to make me feel bad for not wanting to sell things." She starts pacing again, the topic making her anxious.

"I would say tell them to fuck off but…" They both chuckle.

"I know I'm just being dramatic." She groaned and stopped, leaning against the wall.

He stepped toward her. "You have the right to be. It's a big day and people with money get greedy. They want what they want, so they demand it."

"I just wish they would respect me, my art. I said no."

"So, why aren't you selling? Your art is amazing."

"I am, just not two pieces and they just so happen to be the ones no one will leave me the fuck alone about despite the nice big 'not for sale' signs next to them" She announced with a flourish of frustration. Her heeled clicked on the cement to punctuate her lack of ease.

"Oh" He sounded to know she wasn't keeping everything off the market. "So what aren't you selling, if you don't mind my asking?" He pried. There was a pause and the air in the room changed.

"The one of Madi." A pause followed. "And the one of you." She didn't look at him and it confused him.

"I don't mind-"

She looked up. "I do."

"Clarke, I get why you won't sell the one of Madi but you why me?"

Tension grew in the air.

"It feels wrong."

"Why?" His voice was low, the room felt still and quiet. They were maybe six feet apart at this point and she barely stopped to an awkward stance at the wall, a long tall credenza lined the wall next to her with a large mirror hung behind it.

Her hands were met in front of her, just at the front of her skirt. She was ringing them together anxiously now. "It's private." She started. "The piece, not the reason. Not only is it you but I think it's my masterpiece. I can't sell that. I know it seems absurd, I randomly drew you and it turned out to be the best thing I've ever created somehow." She rambled anxiously. "Like I know I wouldn't be selling you but you never gave me permission to draw that and I just drew it. You were burned into my mind, how happy you are around Octavia. I had to draw it, just like the image of Madi hearing her mother had died. I had to draw it. I can't sell those moments. I captured them, but I would never want to share them like that, not for money. Not with random people who have no respect for you or her or the subject and emotion and ugh." She vented off the steam she had been holding in with one long-winded statement. Her eyes found him and they were a bit glazed.

The words she used, which likely felt like words vomit to her, felt like a beautiful song to him. They pulled on his heartstrings and tugged on something carnal inside him. Every feeling he couldn't explain was stirring and heat, a desire, a need rose inside him. He felt like she was protecting him in a way which didn't make sense given she was talking about her art and not about him but he couldn't stop the feeling it gave him. The same feelings he had when she took him to her room and showed him the drawing. He was blown away which was a very common thing to feel around this woman. The weight he had sitting in his chest and the heat rising through him were heavy. A whirlwind of thoughts plagued him in those seconds after she said what she had and he had to decide if he was going to act on the idea that had arisen in the back of his mind. That split-second agony of decision making. He made his choice though, agony aside.

"I'm sorry but…" He quickly closed the gap between them and his hand closed in, cupping the side of her neck below her ear. Before either of them knew what was happening his lips had crashed into hers in a chaotic and passionate collision. He was sure she'd fight back, shove him, maybe punch or slap him but she didn't. He didn't feel any hand of protest meet his body in any way. The only thing he did feel was her soft lips kissing back. It was a few seconds that felt like a few eternities, but he drank it in until those hands came to ruin the show. She pushed his chest, gently.

"What the-"

Before she could continue, he defended himself. "I'm sorry, I had to." He took a step away from her.

"The drawing, your passion, you. You drive me crazy."

His words barely left his mouth before she had lept back onto his lips. It would seem he had said the right thing to her or at the right moment because, in that very one, all was lost. The aura in the room had changed to nothing shy of heat lust. Clarke's hands pulled on the front of his button-down and they softly crashed into the wall behind her, him against her. What was only a minute or so of fervent kissing felt like an eternity of hunger that wasn't being fulfilled. Eventually, she left him empty again, breaking from his embrace. Just when he was getting his fill of her she pulled back and took it all away.

Clarke separated from him and moved a foot or so over to the credenza beside them. She locked eyes with him through the reflection in the mirror. He watched her every move and the next one would steal his soul. Like the devil itself was taking over her, she flicked that pretty white skirt up and presented a perfectly creamy white ass barely covered with a black lacy panty. If he had any coherency left in his body, it was gone. His eyes flickered between what she had on display back to those gorgeous eyes that were begging him with lust. He needed no more. Autonomously, he moved behind her and his hands slid under the fabric and onto her hips, his lips found skin at the back of her neck just under her hair. Clarke pushed back against him, only the fabric he wore protected either of them from what was happening and it was proving too much protection for Clarke because one of her hands left the wood in front of her and found itself on the front of his pants instead. The pressure made him jump. Her hand was delicate but against his growing arousal, it felt like torture. As quickly as she had palmed his cock through his pants, she was unzipping them and he knew there was no foreplay.

She smelled amazing. Her scent was sweet but not obnoxious and he just wanted to inhale more of her. Shy of nipping her flesh, he focused his lips on her skin while freeing himself from the fabric between them. Meanwhile, she slipped out of her panties and poised herself against the credenza, ready and wanting. He looked into the mirror and found her looking back, challenging him, waiting for him. That was his cue. With little to no guidance, he took himself in hand and with the other felt between her legs. She was radiating heat and already slick with anticipation. He slid a finger along her slit and lined up with her hole before putting his hand back at her hip. She didn't let him wait. Feeling him close, her hips just couldn't help but push backward and he slid into her. Both hands now back on her hips, he pulled her into him and filled her. She gasped and he twitched at her reaction. Once he was buried inside her, she dropped her eyes from him and held on to the table.

Clarke was pushing back against him just as much as he had a grip on her hips and was thrusting into her. He couldn't keep his eyes off her, but she couldn't look at him, her head was down or her eyes were closed while they fucked, rattling that table against the wall and shaking their reflection in the mirror. What he did see was her biting her lips and gnawing at it causing it to swell ever so slightly, like she was trying to not make a noise. They were the only two people in that room or even on that floor and he would have died to hear her moan in that moment. Though to be fair, it would have been his undoing. She was breathing heavier and the faintest of noises escaped her which sounded abnormal. He wanted to yell at her to let him hear her.

Her knuckles grew white while she grabbed the table and she hunched over even more, her forearms flush with the table. He leaned in over her just a little and he ramped up his pace. On a whim, his hand fell in front of her and slid over her public mound and in between her folds before finding that precious little button. Finally, he got to hear something from her when a moan mixed with a gasp escaped her throat in surprise. He almost thought for a moment that she had glanced up at him while he ran a circle around the nub, but he was entranced by the feeling of what was happening. This pattern of events leads to a very quick crescendo and another beautiful but soft noise from her. What came out as more of a whine led to her body tensing up and shaking. He felt her walls close around him and he held her up against the table as he plowed into her even harder and came. A groan escaping his own throat. Her orgasm literally pulled it out of him and they slumped forward a bit for a few moments before.

In the pocket of her skirt, her phone buzzed a few times repeatedly. They both knew that was probably more than a sign that they needed to return to the real world above them and end this little fantasy trist they were in. He backed up from her and tucked himself back into his pants. She adjusted her skirt back down and her hair, keeping her eyes on only herself in the mirror.

"I should go back upstairs." She finally said.

Bellamy wasn't sure what to say as reality set in. He and Clarke had just fucked against a mirror in the basement while a hundred or so people wandered above them looking at her art and likely looking for her. She was supposed to be up there networking and mingling, not down here with him. They weren't even down there for ten minutes but it felt so much longer to him. Now he just wondered what she was thinking and how she was feeling. Before he could bother to ask, she made a move to the stairwell.

"Thanks." Was all she said before disappearing into the stairwell. He blinked in confusion. Did she thank him for fucking her or for going out of his way to find her and make sure she was alright? In thought, he looked at the mirror and brushed the clammy dew off his skin and into his messy hair before sighing and pushing his thoughts aside. Moving to leave, his foot hit something soft on the ground and he looked down to see her panties there, the tiny pile they made. Rolling his eyes, Bellamy picked them up and slipped them into his pocket before rejoining the event one floor above them.

Clarke could feel a pink in her cheeks when she hit the top of the stairwell. She moved quickly though because she knew Bellamy was behind her and a room full of people who could have guessed what they were doing down there for the last however long stood before her. Luckily as she re-entered the room, no one was the wiser to her absence or the reappearance. A bit relieved, she used the moment to sneak off to the bathroom to clean up from what just happened only to realize she didn't have her panties on. Horrified, as she left the bathroom she turned for the stairwell only to stop when she saw Bellamy come out of the doorway with his hand at his side. Their eyes met and the look on his face turned to one of knowing as his hand tapped his side. She knew. He had her underwear. Part of her was mad but she was mostly relieved. No one would randomly find her panties downstairs but now she had to get them back from him and she had to face what just happened at some point. For now, she would let it go and let herself disappear into the group which is exactly what she did.

The rest of the event went by painfully slow for her. It felt like a game of tag, avoiding Bellamy and dodging people begging to buy his drawing or the one of her daughter. She ended up being more forward and hearing fewer arguments from people who felt they could convince her to sell the work. Luckily Bellamy being there made a lot of attention go onto him. People who came through the exhibit recognized him as the subject of her centerpiece and it garnered him a lot of attention. Particularly female attention, or so she noticed. By the end of the event Clarke had amassed business cards, a few unreal offers, some commission offers and sales. She and Lorelai closed up the gallery and bid one another a goodnight before she left for home. Raven had taken Madi home a while ago and by the time she got home herself, they were both asleep even though it was only around ten. The event probably tired Madi out and Raven had a long workday. After helping herself to a snack and some water she climbed the stairs with her heels in her hand. Once in her room, she abandoned her heels on the floor and clicked the door closed behind her letting out a sigh of relief that the day was over. Unaware of the smile on her face, she felt very successful but very tired.

Clarke gave her body a good stretch before going to the dresser in her closet to change into something comfortable. As she stepped out of her skirt she remembered what else had happened tonight when she felt a distinct lack of panties on her now naked body. Suddenly aware of her nakedness in her own room, she froze a little before slipping into some shorts and a tank top before turning around. She found herself trying to act nonchalant in her own damn house because she was very aware of her window and her neighbor and what had happened with said neighbor tonight. Luckily as she turned to face the window and she looked out across the lawn, the windows of that house were all black. Relief washed over her that she didn't just give him another show but a pang of disappointment sat in the background. Clarke ignored it and went to bed, to sleep off her very... different day.


	22. Chapter 22

_*Fixed formatting*_

Hey there,

Given the current state of the world and the fact that tomorrow is my birthday, I decided I'd not only push updates for my current published stories but give you two new ones! That's right, I now have four published works up and a fifth in the starting process. They are all a little different, so if you like my style feel free to dive into a new read. One of the two new reads is a canon divergent intended to be a bit more dramatic. And the last is another modern AU that I am very excited about writing, but won't spill much about. ;)

Please, be safe. Stay sane and enjoy life as best you can in these times.

* * *

Clarke slept hard. So hard she had no desire to get out of bed when her phone buzzed repeatedly.

"Ughhhhh." She groaned and fumbled for the phone, sliding it onto the bed beside her with little to no energy. It was useless shit, no real reason to wake her but those damn notifications did the job and now she felt obligated to get up. Especially when she realized it was eleven. Since she adopted Madi, sleeping the day away had been a long lost treat. Conceding, she pulled herself out of bed and into a nice hot shower. While in the shower, she noted a tenderness below the waste and was concerned for a moment only for that concern to turn to embarrassment as she recalled last night. It wasn't just her debut as an artist last night, that's for sure.

Clean and clothed casually for the day, she jogged down the stairs to find food. She also found Madi sitting on the floor in front of the couch with her eyes glued to her phone. The TV was purely ambient noise for the pre-teen.

"Hey, you." She greeted her daughter. Madi leaped up from her spot and ran over to Clarke, throwing her into a hug.

"Last night was so awesome." The praise from her child made her heart swell with love.

"Yeah? Did you have fun?" She asked as they separated again. Clarke turned to the fridge and Madi took up a stool at the counter.

"Yeah. Abby was so proud of you. We had lots of people asking if I was the girl in the portrait, but I don't mind. I'm awesome, so it's natural everyone would be drawn to me."

Clarke laughed at the words coming out of Madi's mouth. She couldn't deny the charisma oozing from the kid. "You were the star of the show." She beamed.

"Oh no, I was not!" She declared, very matter-of-factly. "You should have seen the attention Bellamy was getting."

"I'm sure he's used to it looking like that," Raven interjected, joining them. She had just walked in the front door and was rubbing her hands on a hand towel. Clarke felt a buzz of something at the change in topic but she ignored it while she pulled some cut fruit out of the fridge. She set it out and leaned against the counter at a corner. She plucked a piece of honeydew out of the tub and popped it in her mouth.

"He's so hot," Madi said and Clarke nearly choked. Raven laughed.

"Oh!" Madi perked up after looking at her phone. "Octavia is doing a teen's self-defense class today at a local park and invited me. Can I go?" Her pout was devious. Clarke didn't want her to go and she knew that.

"I'm not sure that's a good idea." She reasoned.

"Well, you're the only one." Madi huffed. "Abby thought it was a good idea. So did Raven." She stuck her nose up as she declared the support she got. Raven shrugged when Clarke clocked her with a knowing look.

"Of course Raven did, but Mom? Huh." She commented. Silence fell over the girls for all of a minute before she gave in. "Fine. You can go. Don't beat everyone up." Clarke rolled her eyes and Madi jumped up, rounded the counter and wrapped her arms around Clarke.

"Thanks, Clarke." She looked lovingly to the older woman. She then ran over to the sliding glass door that faces the Blakes and slid it open.

"Wait, you meant now?" Clarke asked, moving to a stand.

"Well yeah, it's in like forty minutes." Madi said, her face reading 'duh'.

"Okay, I guess." She shrugged like she had no say and popped a grape into her mouth.

"Oh hey Boss, send tall dark and brooding over for me." Raven gestured.

Madi looked back at her, deadpanned. "I mean, that applies to both of them." Both older women choked on laughter. It was so true, but for a 12-year-old to realize that and agree to it was too funny.

"Okay, we'll stick to Freckles then."

"Roger!" Madi jumped out onto the patio and disappeared through the gate and across the lawn. Clarke stopped paying any mind.

"Wait, what? Why do you need him to come over? And when did you and my kid make up a nickname for him?" Clarke shook her head between topics and realized exactly what just happened. She looked confused.

Raven, on the other hand, was all smiles. "I need his help with the car. He offered and I'm holding him to it. And last night Madi was going on about his freckles at the gallery." She shrugged.

"Car? Mine? No." She defied.

"No, Clarke. The Jeep I bought like two months ago? It's over in the dirt, they delivered like two days ago."

"Oh." She blushed. "I guess I've been busy. Does it run?"

"Yep! It needs a lot of work though. He offered to help and he's a clean freak so I figured I'd get him to help with the interior."

Clarke looked out the sliding glass door to see if he was coming, anxiety rising within.

"Oh cool." She idly said. She saw their door open and she quickly turned her eyes back to Raven. "Well, I have uh-" she hesitated. She had no excuse but damn did she need one right now. "... a lot of shit to clean up from this opening." Her words came together and weren't actually far from the truth.

"Okay." Raven was none the wiser. "Have fun?" She laughed.

"Cleaning day all around." She smiled fakely, more than anxious to get out of that room before Bellamy showed up but alas, he appeared on the patio.

"Hey, Madi left your gate open." His voice melted her composure and she quickly walked out of the room and retreated to the upstairs. She vaguely heard Raven laugh about Madi leaving the gate open and how she was going to work Bellamy hard.

In the sanctuary of her room, her back to the door, she breathed for what felt like the first time in hours but had only been moments.

 _'Why am I so anxious?'_ She thought to herself, flushed and ten degrees warmer than the air was. She quickly fanned herself off and decided to put her attention on cleaning. She couldn't deny that part of her wanted to replay what happened last night but at the same time, it wasn't something she was proud of. She told herself it was a moment of weakness, a lapse in judgment, and an embarrassment. On top of that, she droned on to herself about what he could possibly feel or be thinking about her. Did he think she was easy? Did he plan that? The chain of thought just kept digging deeper, back to comments he made the day they spent together when her car was acting up. Finally, she couldn't take her own thoughts and turned on some music. It streamed out of her laptop at a volume that could drown out just about anything in the room and it helped ease her thoughts if it only a little bit.

Time slipped away and Clarke had pretty much all of her storage and art supplies sorted. She was at her laptop now putzing around in Photoshop retouching some photos when someone knocked on the door.

"Yeah?" She said, unaware of the world outside of her focus.

"So what happened?" Raven's question pulled her back to reality and the anxiety she held earlier just dropped like a brick in her gut.

"Uh, what are you talking about?"

"Bellamy," Raven stated. Clarke's body reacted by warming over as she became flustered. She didn't say anything though, just looked at Raven. An awkward silence of thirty or so seconds elapsed before anyone spoke.

Raven moved to sit on Clarke's bed, which faced her at her desk. "Funny thing." She started and Clarke's gut tensed up.

"We were cleaning the interior of the car and I asked about last night, how he felt with all that was going on." Her eyes were just drilling Clarke's for a reaction.

"He got a little.. Weird. Asked me what I was talking about. I explained that I was asking about all the attention he got, for you know, being the man on the wall. He looked so relieved when I explained. I let it go."

She stood and leaned over, her palms on the desk. "Until it dawned on me how weird you were when I told Madi to send him over earlier." Raven's face read as inquisitive with a smirk hiding under pursed lips.

"I'm never wrong, so tell me what I missed that you two are being weird as fuck over." She demanded, her smirk on display in full.

While she couldn't see her own face, she could only imagine it denoted how hot and uncomfortable her body was. Sure enough, her cheeks were red and her leg was shaking under the desk.

"Told you I'm never wrong," Raven noted as she pointed to Clarke's leg on the other side of the table.

"It's nothing." She boldly lied through her teeth. "He checked on me last night and I just said a lot about a lot. I probably weirded him out. You know how I get when I'm stressed out. I talk, a lot. About everything. I ramble and I was emotional. So he probably thinks I'm some kind of freak." Clarke locked eyes with Raven, boring holes through her to see if she would buy her lie. Raven gave no emotion. Clarke couldn't read her.

"Hmmm." She let out a long questioning hum, her eyes narrow as she playfully judged Clarke.

"You're a troll." Clarke rolled her eyes and Raven's stony expression broke into a smile.

"I do love messing with you." Raven moved to the door. "I'm sure he'll get over it." She shrugged. "Jumping on the emotional rollercoaster is a part with being friends with you, some people just have to get used to it." Raven jabbed and winked at Clarke who was very relieved.

Just before closing the door on her way out, Raven left Clarke with a line that sent her into an embarrassed heat. "You're a wild ride, Griffin."

Clarke wanted to throw something at her but she closed the door before she could react. She leaned back in her desk chair with a heavy sigh, releasing her embarrassment through it. It felt like an elephant in the room or sitting on her chest but only two people knew what happened last night. She was so mortified of the reality of it though. Fucking him in the basement wasn't her only one-hit-wonder, so to speak. But this one felt so much different. It felt wrong on so many levels, or at least that is what she kept telling herself. She berated herself, thinking she was easy, weak, and made a bad choice that hurt people. In reality, it didn't affect anyone but her as far as she knew. As she sat there, a cloud moved overhead masking some of the bright light outside the window, showing the life behind reflective windows for a moment. She saw Bellamy walk into the smaller room he spent a lot of time in and her heart rate suddenly picked up. She turned being flustered into being angry. Grumpily, she jumped up out of her chair and left the room.

Once downstairs, she found Raven lounging on the couch. "Did you two finish with the car?"

Raven looked up, a bit tired. "Huh? Oh no. Well, yes but no. We washed everything on the interior pretty good. He had a carpet extractor and it was so satisfying to use. The seats are on the patio to dry." She pointed limply, her legs up on the coffee table.

Clarke nodded. "What do you want to eat?" She offered as she realized what time it was. The sun was creeping away but it was still bright out.

"Give it like ten and you can take the little boss's order. Beef-cake said Octavia would be bringing her home just after five. I'm down for whatever." Raven smiled softly.

"You know she's just going to want noodles." Clarke huffed with a smile and sat down on the other end of the couch. The TV was the perfect level of volume to hear but still talk over and Raven was watching Criminal Minds, a show all three of them had seen many times.

"Mhm" Raven mumbled sleepily, her eyes on the TV. Clarke let her be after that and as projected, Madi walked in the front door just over ten minutes later. She looked tired herself but still bubbly.

"Today was AWESOME." She exclaimed, plopping down between her guardians.

"Oh yeah? You beat the shit out of everyone little boss?" Raven smirked and Clarke rolled her eyes.

"No, I mean-"

"You what?" Clarke sat up and turned to her kid.

"No. We sparred with foam katanas and it was really fun. According to Octavia, I'm 'a little fighter' so I guess I did good?" She shrugged and eagerly defused Clarke.

"Is this going to be a new thing?" Clarke asked, knowing Madi's reply beforehand.

The pre-teen perked up and turned to face the blonde. "Can I?" She asked eagerly to Clarke to smiled and sighed.

"Yeah, I guess." Madi dove in for a hug of appreciation that lasted shorter than expected when Clarke playfully pushed her off.

"On one condition, you go shower after because you smell nastyyyy." Clarke pinched her nose and Raven added to it.

"She's not wrong. You stanky." Madi pouted between the two before she rolled her eyes. They all laughed and she headed for the stairs.

"Hey, wait. What do you want to eat?" Clarke called out through the room between her and the stairs. A disembodied voice replied to her.

"Can we have stir fry?" She asked. Clarke and Raven traded a look of surprise.

"Yeah, sounds perfect," Clarke replied while shrugging to Raven. They were both relieved to not be eating noodles again. Madi lived on pasta before Clarke adopted her, so it was ingrained into her subconscious to always eat noodles. They tried to reprogram that but she just loved pasta.

A few minutes later, when a commercial came on, Clarke pulled herself out of the couch and stretched her hands over her head. "Guess I should get cooking." She smiled.

"Want help?" Raven half-heartedly asked. Without hesitation, Clarke clocked her with a look of sarcasm that silently denoted she was nuts to ask and knew better. Raven smirked and settled into a bit more comfortably, leaning into the arm. After a tasty meal and a quick clean up of the kitchen, the trio sought refuge in the comfort of the couch and watched a few episodes of Criminal Minds together. Once in bed later that night, Clarke was restless. The room was too hot, too cold without a blanket. The light of her clock and powerstrip bothered her as if she was noticing them for the first time. And she was thinking about everything and nothing all at the same time. Literally nothing of substance was on her mind and yet there was a lot of it. She finally gave up and got out of bed. A few steps away she turned back to grab her phone off her pillow and she caught the glimpse of light across the lawn.

He was awake too. It was past two in the morning and he wasn't just awake; He was working out. The sheer panels over her window obscured things just enough for her privacy but she could see the outline of his naked torso and the waistband of something black covering the rest of him as he hoisted his body up in that door jamb. Up, down, up, down. The pattern wasn't slowing down in the few reps she watched. He just effortlessly pulled his own weight up and down as if he weighed nothing. He finally dropped and stretched, turning toward the window. The slight difference of dry and wet skin was just barely noticeable through her curtains, telling her he had worked himself into a sweat. Brainlessly, she moved around the foot of her bed to the window and created the smallest gap in her curtains to look out, unobstructed. He looked soaked. Doing cross-body arm stretches and rolling his neck, she peered out just a little bit more, all but drooling. Suddenly, his head rolled to a stop and his eyes, dark as they may be, landed right on her window and she froze. A wave of fear and stiffness penetrated her body and took over any voluntary power she had. Of course, the curtain was dropped and the two-inch gap she had made was back to never existing. Clarke didn't realize she had ducked down and was not kneeling under the sill.

Blue eyes flickered around the room and she reassured herself. "There is no light on, surely he can't see me." She whispered aloud to herself. Sitting with that thought didn't work though. No, she crawled away from the window and slid back up into bed without so much as a blonde hair passing above the edge of the window sill. Tucked back into her bed safely where she knew she couldn't be seen, day or night, she relaxed. Eventually, she faded into slumber, probably exhausted from embarrassing herself.


End file.
